Steph Davis and Ian Mitchard were married Nov. 3 at their off-the-grid octagonal cabin near Monticello, Utah. Lisa Hathaway, a friend of the couple and a marriage officiator designee of Grand County, Utah, officiated.
The bride, 46, is a professional rock climber, BASE jumper and wingsuit flyer, as well as a blogger, author and public speaker. She is the author of “Learning to Fly: An Uncommon Memoir of Human Flight, Unexpected Love, and One Amazing Dog” (Simon & Schuster, 2013) and “High Infatuation: A Climber’s Guide to Love and Gravity” (The Mountaineers Books, 2007).
Ms. Davis graduated from the University of Maryland and received a master’s degree in literature from Colorado State University. She is the daughter of Connie Davis and Virgil Davis of Green Valley, Ariz.
The groom, 38, is a tandem instructor at Skydive Moab, a sky-diving operation in Moab, Utah, as well as a wingsuit flyer and BASE jumper. He has two bachelor’s degrees, one in industrial engineering from Purdue University and the other in nursing from the University of Maryland. He is a son of Leonard Mitchard of Annapolis, Md., and Rosemary Eyre-Brook of Charlottesville, Va.
Ms. Davis and Mr. Mitchard met at various air sports events and gatherings over the years but did not fall in love until late fall 2013, when both were car camping and sky diving near Skydive Arizona in Eloy, Ariz. She was sleeping in her Honda Fit and he in the green rusty van he called home at the time. On a few of their early dates, they cooked dinner together in his van. “I had no kitchen so she brought the stove,” he said.
She also brought the quinoa, which was their main course. After dinner, Mr. Mitchard played the guitar. “I was like ‘Hey, Ian is really cute,’” she recalled. “I never really noticed that before.”
At the time, she was emerging from a long depression after the death of her second husband, Mario Richard, who died while wingsuit flying during a flight with Ms. Davis in 2013 in Italy’s Dolomite Mountains. (Ms. Davis’s first husband, whom she had divorced, was Dean Potter, a well-known rock climber, slack rope walker and all-around daredevil who died in 2015 in a wingsuit flying accident in Yosemite National Park.)
“When Ian and I fell in love, I didn’t expect it to happen on any level,” she said. “But, I’d just been through a pretty difficult experience where I didn’t expect it. We have to accept the bad things, we have to, but also the good things.”
Mr. Mitchard, who was teaching sky diving in California at the time, soon drove to Moab and moved into Ms. Davis’s home, a 1968 double-wide trailer with about 20 pairs of climbing shoes lined up neatly on the porch. When he arrived, she welcomed him with a homemade apple pie. “I’m one to deliberate on decisions, especially of that magnitude, but this one just felt like the right decision,” he said.
They have a lot on common. Both approach their dangerous pursuits methodically. Both love coffee and cats. They are frugal; avoid meat, sugar and television; dislike shopping for clothes and do not carry any debt. Her Instagram feed, with nearly 90,000 followers, is filled with photos of their climbing and flying adventures around the world. On it, she recently described the groom this way: “My partner in everything, soul flyer, fixer of stuff, blow dryer of kittens, maker of music and spreadsheets.”
Last Jan. 2, they climbed Castleton Tower, a tall sandstone formation that stands out like a supermodel among the squat mesas and buttes around Moab. At the top, they were changing out of their climbing gear and into their flying gear when he knelt down and proposed with a diamond necklace. (Like many climbers, Ms. Davis doesn’t wear rings.) “I didn’t think anything would change if we got married and that’s when I knew I wanted to get married,” he said.
She knelt down, too, and said yes. Then, they jumped off the tower in their wingsuits, flying like spirits over the desert.
What about the obvious, the possibility of death? “It’s in our face all the time,” Mr. Mitchard said, even if they avoid risks.
Both said they were prepared to die, legally and financially at least. “We have taken care of the logistical things in our lives because we know we are mortal,” said Ms. Davis, who seems very calm and serious until she breaks into a smile, which she does often.
Still, she added: “My biggest life dream would be for Ian and me to live this long, happy life and then be together in our bed and holding hands and pass away together. It could happen!”
