JACKSON - Brian Logue and Sharon Ruther recently woke up late and missed their wedding but none of the 5,500 wedding guests paid any mind.

An enormous gathering, you say? Not for the National Elk Refuge.

Every winter a handful of couples are married on a horse-drawn sleigh among thousands of elk. A red sleigh stops in the herd, a couple stands in the sleigh, an officiant leads the vows, a photographer captures the white weddingscape.

Brian and Sharon had forgotten to set their wedding alarm and missed their plane from Ohio to Jackson.

"We're always late. It's just one of the things we have in common," Sharon said.

Luckily no guests were waiting for them in Jackson, where they arrived a day later than expected. Finally here, the couple were struck by the Teton and Gros Ventre ranges, the backdrops for their vows.

Just after exchanging rings, Brian sat back in the sleigh, breathed in the clean, freezing air and said, with a cheery Ohioan intonation, "Gotta tell you Sharon, that was a good idear."

His buzzed hair and bright red ears swiveled around, as though he were counting the elk, trying to take a mental snapshot of his wedding guests.

"This is excellent. We could just park out here all day," he said.

"Honey, I'm cold. Get over here," Sharon said, calling Brian to her side of the sleigh by patting the purple robe that wrapped her wedding dress. Brian, suited under a peacoat, obliged, sitting beside her as the horses rounded the herd and headed home.

The couple first met on Match.com. They lived about 30 minutes from each other, outside Akron, Ohio. After a few dates, both Sharon, 50, and Brian, 46, recognized that they shared many interests: A love for the West, an appetite for excellent foods, a hatred for beets and perhaps most important a craving to spend simple time together. They hung out with animals on Brian's small farm, watched videos, cooked, sold meat at local farmers markets, gathered with family. After three months, he proposed.

Both lovers of the cold, Brian and Sharon agreed that an elk refuge wedding was an excellent idea.

"When you get out there you realize how vast it is," Sharon said of the ceremony. "You feel so tiny."

Tiny is not an adjective befitting a bride on wedding day. But for Sharon, who had married twice before - both times with big ceremonies and an overwhelming number of guests - the small wedding party and open space for the ceremony were ideal.

It was also Brian's third wedding, and for him the simplicity and beauty of the sleigh ride was the most important part.

"The center of attraction is those elk; we were borrowing their time," he said.

Getting married on the National Elk Refuge isn't for everybody, said Tom Jordan, the Jackson municipal judge and circuit court magistrate who officiates most civil unions in Jackson Hole.

"You know, if the bride wants to wear a low-cut fancy dress, it's probably not right for them," Jordan said.

But Brian and Sharon fit the mold. In most cases, marriages on the refuge attract out-of-towners on their second or third marriages, with few or no guests.

"There are people who enjoy the beauty of creation, the beauty of nature," Jordan said. "They enjoy the wildlife, they enjoy something nontraditional, and beautiful in a simple way."

"You're guaranteed to have a stunning backdrop and wildlife in the background," said Lori Iverson, outdoor recreation planner at the refuge.

She reminds anyone thinking of marrying within the refuge borders that the ceremony must take place on a sleigh or at the visitors center.

Beyond beautiful, the ceremony is a simple one. That suited Brian and Sharon, who were bored with wedding hullabaloo. Their wedding cake was purchased off the shelf at Albertsons, and their engagement and wedding rings were picked out without drama or fuss.

"We didn't bury our ring in a muffin. We don't need all that hoopla stuff," Brian said.

But the location even without guests, and even though Brian had never been within 100 miles of Jackson before was important to them. Though Ohio houses their families, jobs and many good memories, the couple feels their spirits live out West.

"It's just that we were born in the wrong part of the country," Brian said.

They will take an elk-antler chandelier home as a memento of their wedding.

The Logues don't expect to move West anytime soon, but they spent a few extra days here on honeymoon, enjoying Jackson with no set schedule.

The couple also plan to make a yearly pilgrimage to Jackson around their anniversary.

"We were planning to go to Yellowstone," Brian said. "It's not going to happen this time, so we'll do it next time."

If only they don't miss their flight.