Sunday Summary #57

Friends, Recommendations, and the Countdown Begins!

Hey ,

Welcome to Scho & Jo’s 57th Sunday Summary. This edition of the Sunday Summary was written on a Monday in Jen's parent's home while Elliot and Ollie remain anchored on PIVOT in Boot Key Harbor in Marathon, Florida.It is the last week of our work month in the Keys! The past few weeks have flown by and we are so excited to restart our Great Loop in a little over a week. Here’s a recap of our last week:

Last Week.

We prepared for a few days of intense weather with winds of 24 knots (27mph/44kph) plus gusts. Thanks to our Mantus anchor and our great hide-away in our protected anchorage in Curry Hammock State Park, we were able to avoid the swell, wind, and chaos from the weather system. The windy weather also brought with it some kite surfers which was really fun to watch!

Midweek, we rented a car to drive to Miami for the Current Awards - an event celebrating influencers in the marine industry. We met a lot of really wonderful people and were excited as one of our favorite sailing YouTubers,

, won the sailing and cruising category!

It was our final week with our friends, Nate and Alicia from

. We enjoyed paddle boarding, playing Settlers of Catan, and grilling out until we see them again for more boat life adventures. It was amazing to spend three weeks with them on PIVOT. We even might have opened them to adding boatlife to their very long

bucketlist

.

Jen’s best friend since junior high school, Molly, visited us on PIVOT for the weekend. She drove 7+ hours from Jacksonville, FL to Marathon for a weekend of boat life fun. She and her boyfriend, Kyle, were our first guests aboard PIVOT on Cumberland Island last April. We were very excited to actually take her out on PIVOT this trip as we were too new and nervous to have guests aboard and to cruise with them on PIVOT during her last visit. Now that we have a year of boat life, gained a ton of new experiences, and were more confident in our skills and ready to take her out to Sombrero Reef for some snorkeling.

After heading to the reef, we enjoyed a paddle board ride through the mangroves in Boot Key Harbor where we saw a ton of wildlife including a bonnethead shark, a small blue heron, a white ibis, a sea turtle, several fish, hundreds of Cassiopeas (the most common jelly fish in the Florida Keys), and a pod of dolphins. Sunday we encountered another patch of windy weather so we opted to take our dinghy out for another mangrove adventure.

It was a lot of fun to have our friends and family visit us over the past month. It’s been a great opportunity to refill our cups and make memories we’ll cherish for the rest of our lives. Although it's been really busy, we're so grateful to have so many of these great memories to look back on later in life.

This Week.

Jen traveled with Molly back to Jacksonville, so she could attend a doctor’s appointment and Elliot and Ollie are holding down the boat back in Boot Key Harbor. This is our final work week before we restart our great loop. Our countdown is under 10 days away (weather permitting) and we are so excited to restarting the loop.

Jen will be returning to Marathon later this week and we’ll both be attending a Sunset Celebration for fellow Loopers (people who are doing the Great Loop) this Saturday. If you’re attending the event, please say hello. We really love meeting the people who watch our videos!

"Great things come out of patience."-Unknown

 Videos. 

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

What we learned from owning a boat for a year (and living onboard full-time)

If you haven’t already, we would love for you to share our videos with your friends and family to spread the love. It's a FREE way to show us support that goes a very long way!

 Great Loop Recommendations. 

We are looking for recommendations for destinations and spots along our Great Loop to go see, visit, and enjoy. It's been a real challenge for us to keep track and stay organized with the many wonderful recommendations we've received thus far. So we've created a Google Form to help us stay organized.

 Book & Resource Recommendations. 

We are looking for resource recommendations for the various environments along the waterways on the Great Loop. We want to learn more about the plants and animals in the various ecosystems in the ever changing waterways along the loop. We bought a Florida Waterbirds book back in Georgetown, SC and have been enjoying learning more about the natural environment but are craving more. If you know of any additional books to help us identify plants or species anyone who specializes in the regional environments we travel through, please email us!

 Gratitudes. 

We bought a 34’ (10.4 meters) boat with two cabins so we could have friends and family visit us. It makes us so happy to have had Alicia, Nate, Nicole, Joey, and Molly visit while we are in the Keys. I know we’re going to laugh and smile when we look back on the memories when we’re older. We get to share a piece of our daily life with loved ones and they get to experience a snippet of boat life in return. We’re planning on many more guests aboard PIVOT as we travel around America’s Great Loop and are excited for the memories to come!

Peace and love,Jenn + Elliot