In December, Michael had “the conversation” with Caity’s parents, and they equipped him with a GoPro to capture the special moment. Michael told Caity that he had a late anniversary present for her – a weekend trip to Seneca Lake. This was a completely believable story because Michael is a chronic late gift giver. It was also perfect because Caity is a self-proclaimed wine-aholic. Michael booked the trip for the weekend before Christmas, so Caity asked if they could reschedule – they had brunch plans with friends scheduled for that weekend and she also hadn’t finished Christmas shopping yet. Michael kindly told her “No, brunch can happen another time and we can order presents online.”
On Friday night, they drove up to The Inn at Miles Wine Cellars: a haunted, charming, bed and breakfast (little-known fact: Caity is obsessed with ghosts).
The bed and breakfast overlooked Seneca Lake, and on Saturday morning they woke to a gorgeous sunrise. Michael had planned the day as follows: breakfast, wineries, lunch, state park (where he planned to propose), more wineries, and finish with a celebratory dinner. But, it snowed for most of the morning. Not a lot, but enough to make the shoes that Caity had packed difficult to walk in. The day started as planned – they worked their way down the lake, stopping at each winery they saw. After lunch, Caity told Michael that she wasn’t really interested in going to the state park because it was cold outside and she really didn’t want to hike. She suggested that he just drop her off at one of the wineries nearby and then go to the park by himself. He promised that it would be a short trip and that the view of the gorges and waterfalls would be worth it.
They drove to the state park and tried to figure out how to navigate to the gorges. The snow that had fallen earlier in the day made it difficult to walk on the dirt paths (especially in Caity’s shoes), and Caity was freezing. Recognizing that this was not the perfect moment and also realizing that if he dropped the ring into a gorge it would be lost forever, Michael nixed the plan and decided to move on with the day and see how things unfolded. Unfortunately, they hit a few too many wineries and did a few too many tastings, and were hungover by 5 PM. Back at the bed and breakfast, Caity tried to recover and took a nap while Michael tried to formulate a new plan. They made it to their dinner reservation for 7:30 PM (again, it was supposed to have been a celebratory meal), but Caity couldn’t even look at her food. And, for the first time ever, she left a glass of wine untouched. Michael was striking out. But, then he remembered how beautiful the sunrise was that morning, and told Caity that they should just go to bed early, recover, and wake up early to see the sunrise on the lake.
Sunday morning, they woke up early, packed, and headed down to the dock on the lake. Michael said that he wanted to get a picture of the two of them, so he set his camera up on a tripod and set it on a timer. Unbeknownst to Caity, he scheduled the camera to take a series of photos, and also pressed “record” on the GoPro. They took a nice, smiling photo on the dock, but then the camera kept snapping. Caity wasn’t sure what was happening until Michael was down on one knee. Of course, she said “Yes!”
Michael and Caity 