Caroline Cornell and Daniel Patrick Logan weren’t technically off the grid when they found romance on the Lost Coast of Northern California, the state’s most remote oceanfront area, in the summer of 2014. But the routes each had taken to get there could definitely be described as off the beaten path.
The two first met in middle school in southern Vermont, and later attended the same high school, Burr and Burton Academy, in Manchester, Vt. As teenagers they ran in the same circle of friends, with whom they would ski and snowboard.
Mr. Logan, 32, said that although there was never an acknowledged attraction between them back then, Ms. Cornell, 31, was a benchmark. “She was one of those people I would compare other girls to,” he said. “I would say, That girl’s no Caroline, but that’s OK.”
Ms. Cornell saw Mr. Logan as her best friend. “He’s just really sweet and didn’t judge, always made you laugh,” she said.
When he graduated from high school, in 2007, Mr. Logan went to study massage in Nevada City, Calif. Following her graduation, in 2008, Ms. Cornell and a group of their mutual friends soon began traveling across the country to attend concerts by bands reimagining the Grateful Dead. “That’s what I did instead of college,” Ms. Cornell said. Mr. Logan would often meet up with them at shows.
Both spent the next 10 years living transiently. When they weren’t traveling, Ms. Cornell worked as a bartender and at other odd jobs, sometimes staying with her parents and grandparents at their homes in Key West, Fla., while Mr. Logan worked at a marijuana farm in Honeydew, Calif., which is on the Lost Coast. He also continued to study massage, in Thailand and in the Finger Lakes region of New York.
In July 2014, Ms. Cornell, who had remained in regular contact with Mr. Logan, took a seasonal job at the farm where he was working. Both had recently become single, and they commiserated over the end of their relatively long relationships. One night, at the only bar in the town, they drank Don Julio 1942 tequila for almost 12 hours. Yet both remember what happened next with absolute clarity.
“We had our first kiss in the parking lot, and we just let it happen,” Ms. Cornell said. “I feel like I was already in love with him because he was my best friend.”
Said Mr. Logan, “It wasn’t until I kissed her that I realized I was going to kiss her.”
Though their relationship remained casual for a few months, each knew it was in a new phase. “There’s really no going back from this,” Mr. Logan recalled thinking.
When her seasonal gig concluded that September, she left while he remained on the Lost Coast. “We talked almost every day on the phone, but I had to drive a four-wheeler to the top of the hill” to call her, he said.
“We were dating even if it wasn’t official,” Mr. Logan added. “We said, ‘It is what it is. We’re not going to ask questions.’”
The following year, after spending time with Ms. Cornell at her family’s place in Key West, he actually did have a question. In March 2015, Mr. Logan called her and asked Ms. Cornell if she was going to be his girlfriend.
Saying no, Ms. Cornell said, risked her losing “the best guy forever.” So she said yes. “But if I’m going to do this,” she recalled thinking, “I’m going to marry this guy.”
Mr. Logan proposed on Valentine’s Day in 2021, while the two were again in Key West. By then they had already bought a property together and were building a home in Rawsonville, Vt., near where both had grown up. Ms. Cornell is now a floral designer in Manchester. Mr. Logan is a licensed massage therapist and also works at the Red Fox Inn, in Bondville, Vt., which his parents have owned and operated since 1984.
On June 17, the couple were married at his parents’ inn before 300 guests. Kate Logan, the groom’s elder sister, officiated after receiving authorization from Vermont’s secretary of state.
The ceremony was part of a four-day celebration, which included several events that together featured a lineup of no fewer than five bands. Those performances were an opening act of sorts for the groom and the bride, who took his surname. After the wedding, they again hit the road for a month of following even more live music events.
