No vino for Chris? Katie Morton and six of her fellow Bachelor in Paradise alums went to the Live in the Vineyard festival in Napa, California, on Sunday, November 3, but her fiancé, Chris Bukowski, was nowhere in sight.
“We’re ready to take on the Catalina Wine Mixer,” Jared Haibon captioned a group photo on Instagram with wife Ashley Iaconetti, Morton, Joe Amabile and Kendall Long, and Krystal Nielson and Chris Randone.
Nielson, 32, also documented the outing, sharing a selfie from the “family road trip” on her Instagram page.
Several fans of the Bachelor franchise pointed out in the comments section of Haibon’s post that Bukowski, 33, was noticeably absent. In response to one Instagram user, the “Help! I Suck at Dating” podcast cohost, 30, clarified, “He couldn’t make it but him and Katie are still together.” Haibon echoed in a second comment, “They’re together and very happy.”
Morton and Bukowski got engaged during the Paradise season 6 finale in September. However, they were not in a good place in their relationship during the reunion special. The medical sales representative took off her engagement ring and spoke about the couple’s engagement in the past tense.
“I’m usually really happy-go-lucky,” she told host Chris Harrison at the time. “I’m usually bouncing all over the place, and I feel like I’ve come to, like, a darkness, and I hate it.”
Despite the tension between them on TV, the reality stars watched the reunion together at a hotel in New York City and subsequently assured fans that they were still an item.
“It took us a few months to really get our bearings (especially with some exceptional and unexpected challenges),” Morton wrote on Instagram after the reunion. “I know none of you will truly understand why things are the way they are but I ask that you trust me and support me as I navigate this new world of mine. Because I’m happy with me and we are finally happy with us. We have grown so much in our friendship and now in our relationship since that day.”
The corporate sales director, for his part, wrote on Instagram, “Love is tough. Love is beautiful. Most importantly love is patient. Sometimes you need a shock to the system to put a fire under your ass. What I felt then I feel even more now. I love you @katieemo and can’t wait to feed you pizza for the rest of our lives. #BachelorInParadise.”
Later in September, the long-distance couple told Us Weekly exclusively that they were taking things day by day. “I don’t think we’re talking about a wedding right now,” Bukowski admitted. “I think the living situation and meshing our lives together is the most important thing right now.”
