Guess what, everyone? The secret’s out: we’re chasing our dreams of buying a sailing catamaran! Our dream of living at sea full-time and sailing around the Caribbean has been two years in the making. Now, we’re excited to launch these videos, sharing our motivations behind this leap and telling the story of the whole process.
The beginning of the end…and the beginning of something new
I (Emily) was knee-deep in my TV anchor career. I generally enjoyed my job, but waking up at 3:30 a.m. every day and telling story after story of C0vid was starting to wear me out. On a beach day with a friend, it hit me more clearly than ever: I wanted to become a travel blogger, to explore the world and tell the stories of the people I met.
Then I met Cole, and I was excited to discover we had similar dreams of travel. On one of our first dates, I told Cole I wanted to buy an RV and travel the country. But because of Cole’s longstanding love of the water and penchant for watching sailing channels on YouTube, Cole said, “What about a sailboat?”
2022: Our year of intention
In early January 2022, we made a vision board together, outlining our goals for the year. Everything we did would be intentional. And as our biggest dream was to travel by boat and figure out remote working, we put a business plan together and started the hunt for our dream boat.
Cole did tons of research, and we decided a 2012-2014 Leopard 44 would be the perfect boat for us, although we’d be happy with any of the top three production sailing catamaran brands (Leopard, Lagoon, Fountaine Pajot). We began to tour boats, attend boat shows, and got a feel for what we did and didn’t like.
In February, we embarked on our wedding elopement adventure and honeymoon in the Bahamas, sailing with our friend Steph, captain of Sail La Vie. It was the trip of a lifetime; we sailed over 300 nautical miles, swam with stingrays, sharks, pigs, and even explored a shipwreck. We came home from that completely invigorated, ready to start the next part of our life.
You’ll also love: Sapona Shipwreck: Diving 100 Years Back in Time
The hunt for our dream boat continued, and in the spring, we knew our dream was starting to become reality: we found the perfect boat.
Or did we?
Let’s just say, navigating this process without a broker is an emotional rollercoaster. Watch the video for the full story!
