Leading The Escapade Are Learning The Ropes While Living Their Best Life
For us “That Feeling” means freedom. It means moving about the world and seeing new places. It means jumping into the water to cool off, lazing in the sun and enjoying afternoon cocktails as the sun sets. It means spearfishing, island hopping and storm-watching. But above all, it means realising how incredible Mother Nature is.
Growing up on Australia’s Gold Coast, Jason Marshall and Janaye MacDonald were no strangers to the sea - spending countless hours swimming, snorkelling and scuba-diving.
Yet, in all this time, it never once occurred to them that their love of the water would be anything other than a fun pastime.
So Janaye, 30, forged ahead with her career in the beauty industry, while 31-year-old Jason worked in the construction sector.
But then, by sheer chance, the couple became hooked on YouTube sailing content - and decided to wave goodbye to the nine-to-five and embark on a life of adventure - documenting their journey on their own Leading The Escapade channel.
“Our love of sailing is a bit of a random one,” admits Janaye. “We’ve both always loved spending time at the beach and travelling.
“Then one day, by chance, we actually found some sailing channels on YouTube and they inspired us to try living this lifestyle of being full-time aboard a boat, travelling from country to country.”
It’s a decision that they have never regretted. “Having your home on the water is so special, you have a new backyard every day if you want to.
“The first time we splashed the boat it was all nerves as we were super new at sailing but when we completed our first successful sail on our own without any help we had tears in our eyes.
“We were so happy and proud of ourselves that we finally made our dream a reality.”
The couple join a host of the sailing world’s most significant influencers in a new global campaign for the Yacht Coatings division of AkzoNobel - in which those taking part reveal what ‘That Feeling’ means to them.
As part of the campaign, they find themselves in the company of fellow Aussie sailors Riley Whitelum and Elayna Carausu from Sailing La Vagabonde and the first woman to sail solo around Antarctica, Lisa Blair.
“They have been our inspiration right from the start,” reveals Janaye. “Hopefully one day we’ll have a performance catamaran like theirs.”
Despite only embarking on their adventures less than two years ago, Janaye and Jason have accomplished much already.
Janaye says: “Our proudest experience would probably be all the miles we have travelled since we started. We’ve travelled through seven countries in the Med, sailed thousands of nautical miles and even kept going through the majority of the cold winter months.
“We’re super proud of our growing YouTube channel. We almost have 25,000 subscribers and have had over 3.2 million views.”
But it hasn’t all been plain sailing: “Our most challenging adventure so far was when we snapped off a mooring ball in strong wind and then later dragged anchor, then broke our anchor windlass and couldn’t pull our anchor up.
“It wasn’t a fun time and lots of things went wrong but we learnt so much from that experience, so once the dust settled it kind of felt like it was a blessing in disguise.”
Next on their agenda is a European summer adventure - journeying through Italy, Malta, France and Spain before crossing the Atlantic to the Caribbean. “But first,” Janaye adds, “we’ll start the year off doing maintenance and upgrades on the boat while it’s winter here in Europe and our boat on the dry dock.”
Ultimately, the future priority for Jason and Janaye remains to continue inspiring others to have the confidence to take the plunge and experience for themselves That Feeling of freedom and joy that comes from boating.
“We really taught ourselves how to sail and handle the boat,” Janaye says. “We barely had any experience but we threw ourselves in the deep end and have learnt so much in doing it this past one and a half years.
“Ultimately we want to inspire others to take the path less travelled instead of sticking to societal norms.
“We absolutely love the freedom being a digital nomad gives us to live this lifestyle and we want others to do the same.”
Find out more about Jason and Janaye:
What does That feeling mean to you?
Tag your content with our hashtags #AkzoNobel #ThatFeeling so that we can celebrate your passion with the sailing world.
Songs for sailing
Our influencers have come together to curate this playlist for you to enjoy when you are out on the water.
