Katie Thurston Gave The Honest Truth About Starting An Engagement “In A Bubble”

Katie Thurston and Blake Moynes’ relationship has been an adventure ever since the pair got engaged on The Bachelorette. On Wednesday, Aug. 18, the Season 17 lead shared a very honest update on Instagram about what it was like having to hide their relationship from the world from the time Moynes proposed to the time their engagement aired on TV. “This was our first selfie together on May 18th,” the 30-year-old bank marketing manager wrote. “We started our relationship in a bubble only to continue our engagement in a bubble. For months we couldn’t be seen together. Our secret trips never felt long enough.”

Thurston went on to explain that after so much time hiding their relationship, she and the 31-year-old wildlife manager couldn’t wait “experience life together.” “Real life,” she said. “The simple things that many of us forget to appreciate. Like the drive to get the coffee together. Or spending time together surrounded by family. Grandma taking a pic with her iPad. Or the simplicity of walking the dogs together. Walking through the ice cream [aisle] deciding a flavor to share. Holding hands during that three-hour road trip. Being a tourist in a city together. Laughing from the spontaneous moments.”

The reality star closed out her caption by revealing that the couple finally got to experience what all of that was like last weekend when she visited her final rose recipient in his hometown of Hamilton, Ontario. “We finally had a taste of that together during my mini trip to Canada,” she wrote. “And as I fly back to Seattle, I’m already counting down the days until we can do it all over again. We knew life was going to be an adventure, but for now, I’m still soaking up the simpler things in life.”

Thurston’s post was inundated with questions from fans about her and Moynes’ relationship. When one person asked why she isn’t moving to Canada to be with her fiancé, she answered honestly. “We are experiencing both home countries together before we plant roots anywhere officially,” she wrote, adding that Moynes will visit the U.S. in a few weeks. And when someone else asked if Blake has ever met her cat, she couldn’t contain her excitement. “NOT YET BUT I CANNOT WAIT,” she responded.

Although the newly engaged couple is experiencing all of the challenges that come with a long-distance relationship, they are still going strong. In an Aug. 10 interview with Access, the Season 17 winner said that he knew they would be compatible fairly early on. “It was seeing how much that we aligned and our openness and how confident we were and decisive,” he said. “I was a lot like that on the season I was on prior, and I recognized a lot of the same things in Katie.”

Blake has no regrets about joining the cast mid-way through the season after failing to find love with both Tayshia Adams and Clare Crawley on Season 16 of The Bachelorette. “I just felt like I had to pull the trigger and see if this could be what I think it could,” he continued. “And right off the bat it was, and it just continued to be that way and it gets stronger and stronger every day.”