Sunday Summary #99

Our Great Loop TOTAL Expenses

Hi ,

Welcome to Scho & Jo’s 99th Sunday Summary. This edition of the Sunday Summary was written aboard PIVOT who is still anchored in Islamorada, Florida.

Last Week.

We’ve been relishing in the routine we’ve created here in Islamorada. On Monday, we mailed the sticker packs from our shop. Elliot has been going for some long runs (~9 miles/14km) while I’ve been doing HIIT workouts and taking Ollie for walks. We’re starting to feel like locals as we see familiar faces and begin to recognize the hum of our anchorage - noticing the routines of several people in our anchorage. Ours has been focused on exercise, working, and watching the sunset over dinner.

Yesterday we enjoyed a date day at our favorite spot in Islamorada, the Florida Keys Brewing Company. We enjoyed eating some delicious nachos while listening to their local band sing tunes catered to island life, manatees, and the pelicans at Robbie’s Fish Camp. Today we’ll be spending some time doing boat maintenance as we have a super calm day. Elliot will be scrubbing the bottom of our hull as some soft growth has begun to form in the past 7 weeks of being anchored here. Meanwhile, I’ll be cleaning our waterline and doing some waxing of the hull.

This Week.

We’ll be continuing to edit more videos this week, with the very exciting Big Chute Marine Railway being released in the later part of the week. We’re super excited to edit and release that video of such a one-of-a-kind lock. Lastly, we’ll have Jen’s younger sister visiting us and we’re excited to share a small piece of boat life with her.

 Videos. 

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

CANAL LIFE on the TRENT-SEVERN (Rosedale to Lake Simcoe)

BEAM SEAS across LAKE SIMCOE (Cruising to the Port of Orillia)

 Expense Reports. 

Yesterday we shared our last Great Loop Expense post totaling our final costs. This blog post shares our total expenses as we traveled around America’s Great Loop in one year. After sharing detailed, month-by-month expenses, we have totaled up the past 12 months in this post. By sharing our monthly Great Loop expenses, we hope it will inspire prospective loopers that it can be done at all different ages and with different budgets.

During the past year, we tweaked and re-tweaked our spreadsheet to create a comprehensive

Great Loop Budget Calculator & Expense Log

. There are three main sections of this spreadsheet including the calculator, overall expense summary, and monthly expense reporting. The budget is where you can estimate how much your Great Loop will cost.

“The secret to budgeting is that it needs to be honest. Not what you think it should be or wish it could be, but what it really is.” ― Lisa Conway-Hughes

 From the Eyes of Ollie. 

Oh boy, it’s getting hot! When we go for my morning walk on shore, my tongue is hanging out and I’m panting. My parents say it’s something with hu-mid-i-ty, I don’t know what that it. It’s hot so they make me swim to our dinghy after the walks so I get wet and salty. The rest of my day is spent in my clubhouse, drying off from my short swim and enjoying the breeze in my fur coat. I take a lot of naps until I hear a dolphin. Once I hear a dolphin, I’m on the lookout!

 Gratitudes. 

In the past year as we’ve written 13 monthly expense reports, we’ve had time to reflect on how grateful we are to be able to do this adventure of a lifetime. Although we showed it’s possible to travel on the Great Loop on a budget, we also recognize it’s not something everyone can do. We’re grateful for the opportunity and all of the lessons we gained in the process. It’s been a whirlwind of a journey with many highs and lows, but we wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Peace and love,Jenn + Elliot