Sunday Summary #50

Back in the Swing of Things! Kind of...

Hello ,

Welcome to Scho & Jo’s 50th Sunday Summary. This edition of the Sunday Summary was written aboard PIVOT who is located in an anchorage outside of Beaufort, SC. Thank you to everyone who responded to our last email with questions! It really means a lot to us to have people who are genuinely interested in what we're doing and have questions. So thank you!

Last Week.

We have full intention on making these emails weekly so we don't send super long emails, but due to spotty wifi last week's email did not get sent, so it's been the best we can do. We are excited to announce this has been resolved, thanks to getting a hotspot! We're also not filming daily vlogs as we travel south, so we figured we'd share some of the most memorable experiences with you here. A lot has happened in the past two weeks. Let's catch you up!

We left Belhaven, NC for one of our favorite stops along the Great Loop, Oriental, NC. It wasn't short of some "excitement" as we were cruising into the channel into Oriental, our engine stopped. This was a bit of a scare as Elliot prioritizes engine maintenance and daily engine checks. After setting our anchor near the channel so Elliot could diagnose our problem, we came to the conclusion that we were low on fuel and due to some big wakes from passing boats, the diesel wasn't getting to the engine as it normally does. So we basically filled up on fuel and spent an unexpected night at a marina instead of the free docks available in Oriental. All spirits were brought back to positive after some unlimited water and electricity at the marina. Theres nothing a hot shower can't fix.

Leaving Oriental, we headed south to Beaufort, NC and had one of the most incredible dolphin encounters cruising so far. As we traveled south on Adam's Creek, a pod of dolphins swam towards our boat, passed us by, and then proceeded to do flips! We looked at each other in disbelief and amazement. It was incredible!

One of the things we've been focusing on during our trip south has been making a ton of small upgrades and quality of #boatlife improvements. This was also the case in Beaufort, NC. While we enjoyed the stunning sunsets and the incredible hiking at the Rachel Carson Reserve, Elliot did several more boat improvement projects while we were anchored like revamping our alternator charging system and a new oil change!

As we've been cruising south, Elliot has continued to do his fuel consumption calculations. He noticed that our fuel consumption has almost doubled since we proceeded south. We spoke to our friends and boat buddies,

, about it and they suggested it might be the growth on our prop or propeller from spending 6 months, primarily stationary, in the Chesapeake Bay. So once we arrived to Mile Hammock Bay, Elliot borrowed their wetsuit and jumped into the cold water to check it out. They were right! We had a ton of barnacle growth on our prop and propeller. Elliot proceed to attempt to scrape off the barnacles and was only able to remove a few of them.

We left Mile Hammock Bay at sunrise and headed Wrightsville Beach on a Saturday, which is not on the top of our fun list. We were able to navigate the congested waterways that come with gorgeous weather in these beach towns, but may have a few more gray hairs from it. The six of us (four humans and two dogs) enjoyed walks on the beach, tacos, and margaritas in Wrightsville Beach. It was so much fun to enjoy some of the things about boat life that initially sold us on this lifestyle and adventure at the beginning.

The next day we had perfect weather to cruise south through Cape Fear! The wind was at our back giving us a little extra push, and the tide with us, making our cruise through this potentially challenging waterway, a breeze! It was a totally different experience than our cruise north where we were fighting the current and Jenn got seasick. On this same day, we cruised past sunset for our first time ever to our anchorage in Calabash Creek. The following day at anchor, Elliot went back into the cold water (with a wetsuit, thanks to our friends,

 (pictured below)) to remove more barnacles from our propeller which helped our fuel consumption and speed.

We celebrated Jenn's 30th Birthday with a short cruising day through Myrtle Beach and the rock pile, arriving at our favorite marina on the east coast, Osprey Marina. We stopped at this marina on our way north when our friends Andy and Gwen introduced it to us initially, and many of our viewers have recommended it since. It has heap fuel, clean bathrooms, and a very reasonable price for overnight transient docks, the perfect combination for two boaters on a budget! Elliot cooked up a delicious Indian feast for dinner and we enjoyed playing Settlers of Catan with Andy and Gwen.

Two nights at Osprey Marina was just what we needed to refuel our boat and our souls. We left Osprey and headed to our next anchorage in Georgetown, SC. While we were entering the anchorage, one of our YouTube viewers saw us cruising in, waved us down, and invited us to dinner with his wife. Joel and Peggy were incredibly generous, kind, and spoiled Ollie with treats. We were overwhelmed by the generosity and kindness of our viewers and really blown away by the experience. The last two nights, we spent in anchorages with some great access to free boat ramps giving us easy access to take Ollie out, thanks to Gwen and Andy for showing us a lot of great places to anchor that are dog friendly.

Nights at free docks: 0

Nights at anchor: 11

Nights at a marina: 3

So we're getting back into the swing of things, slowly but surely and Elliot is doing a ton of work on our boat to make our Great Loop during 2022 the best it could be. We turned on our heat exchanger, and have been enjoying HOT showers and dishes for the first time. Can you believe we traveled 800+ miles with cold showers and cold water? It's been a game changer! We've improved the efficiency of our alternator charging, and finished the final touches of our v-berth with headliner.

We know we've been going south rather quickly, or as quickly as a trawler going 6 knots can go. You may be thinking, why are we traveling so fast? We're trying to get back to northeast Florida so we can spend the holidays with our families.

This Week.

We'll be enjoying Beaufort, SC with lunch at Low Country Market with our friends . Later this week, we continue cruising south to Savannah, Jekyll Island, and Cumberland Island. If you want to see more daily shenanigans, follow us on Instagram and watch our Instagram Stories.

 Videos. 

Incase you missed it, here are all the vlogs we’ve released since our last Sunday Summary:

Taking a Break from Boat Projects for Some Inspiration | Annapolis Power Boat Show 2021

Installing our new Mantus Anchor || Replacing our Old CQR

Our new Electric Dinghy Engine for the Great Loop | ePropulsion Spirit 3.0 Review

 Extra. 

Back in November, we had the opportunity to meet two of our internet friends, Adam and Kathryn, who are the faces behind Adventures of A+K, for the first time in real life! We spent 3 amazing days with them on PIVOT. While they live in a van and travel around the US full time, we were able to show them what our life on the water is like from dinghy rides, to sleeping and showering on a boat, to taking the boat out and using our new anchor for the very first time. You can check out their video from our time together here:

3 days of BOAT LIFE 🛥 on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland with Scho & Jo!

Our video with A+K will be out tomorrow at 10am!

 Feedback. 

We'd like to hear YOUR feedback as we plan videos for 2022. Do you enjoy watching our daily vlogs? Are they too much? Too little? Do you enjoy our emails? Is there something you would like to see or hear more about? We would love to hear your feedback either by responding to this email or emailing us at [email protected].

 Gratitudes. 

We are incredibly grateful for the opportunity we've had to meet some of our viewers in person, Joel and Peggy. Putting a piece of our lives out there on YouTube puts us in a very interesting place because people know us more than we know them. So getting the opportunity to meet with and get to know the people behind the usernames, is really special for us and means just as much, if not more to us than it might to our viewers. So thank you Joel and Peggy for a lovely night out!

Peace and love,Jenn + Elliot