Video-Right before the Aeolus was FLOODED

This is a video that captured footage right before the Aeolus became flooded after the crash on June 24 at 12:30. This will be submitted to the Japan Coast Guard and it was also uploaded onto the "Blind Sailing" official website. 　
【The Video】
This is from a camera that was set on the port side of the stern on the Aeolus (about 5 meters from the  water surface).
This was right before the Aeolus was flooded.
Jiro Shinbo retrieved the data (SD card) from the camera before he jumped onto the life boat.
Initially the data was too wet to play but we were able to restore the data. We were unable to digitalize it so this is a video that was recorded when the footage was played on a PC monitor.

　June 24, 2013 1:45 PM          Project D2 Creative Division

Video REPORTS June10

Shinbo-san struggling with the PC

Go Aeolus!

Shinbo Report- Hurt Shoulder

Hiro hurt his knees too

MEALS on Sails!

June 12, 2013 (Wed) 6:30 PM  N 35.37 E 140.56 Slight rain Winds:Northeast 12 knots Wave height: 3m　Choshi, Chiba Prefecture Inubosaki

 I'm back! Today I will write about what I ate during this trip. Before that, let me tell you that Hiki-san is a bit of a well-known chef in the yachting community. Just a little tweak of instant noodles or boi-in-the-bag food can enhace the flavors. As I blogged before, in winds at 25 knots, it's an effort to maintain your body position. However, the infamous chef has not problem and can magically cook up something delicious for us. House Foods and Toyo Rice are our sponsors and they have donated a lot of food for us. The first night we had curry & rice using a combination of House and Toyo products. There was egg in it and was delicious. We also have other ready to eat food like curry noodles, rice in broth, rice porridge with pickled plum, miso soup and rice. My favorite breakfast item is the como bread. Como bread is a type of long lasting pastry and we have crossaints and muffins. An absolute necessity on long voyages.  Having a crossaint with coffee is just delicious. Como bread donated some items like they did for the Earth Run. Thank you very much. I asked the chef the secrets to making everything taste so good and he said to keep it simple and use the sea water for added flavor.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/13/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

THANK YOU Kuroshio

June 12, 2013 12 PM N 35.24 E 140.43 Cloudy Winds:Northeast 15 knots Wave height: 2 m with some rolling waves. Off the coast of Kujukurihama, 12 miles to Choshi

　As I blogged yesterday, it was a day of survival. The day before that we were swept away a couple of miles north by the waves in Enshuri even though we were in the rhumb line(the line that connects the vessel to the point of destination). The weather forecast says a typhoon that was heading towards Kyushu is not heading in our direction and winds from east and northeast will continue for several days. Ugh! The winds are blowing from the direction we are heading to. With yachts, facing your destination, if the winds are blowing from the side or diagonally from behind, we would be able to proceed straight. However, if the winds are blowing from ahead, the yacht will zigzag left and right and we lose a considerable amount of speed.  And what's even more inconvenient is the yacht will be rocked up and down and sideways. I think many of you have been on trains where you are walking and the slightest jolt sideways makes you lose balance. Well, it's worse on a yacht. When the yacht is being hit with winds going 25 - 35 knots it takes a lot of effort to even hold yourself upright. Even simple chores like changing clothes or walking with a cup of coffee in your hands can be exhausting. I'm a slow mover as it is and it makes me even slower. So we struggled with the head winds but as soon as we passed Bosohanto, we started to pick up a little speed. The Aeolus is facing the direction of 110 degrees but is moving at 85 degrees. Wow! We're doing a little over 7 knots (about 13km/hr). We must be riding the Kuroshio that's in this area. We are all very excited with the speed. We were just talking yesterday after hearing about the approaching typhoon that we may have to take shelter at a port and if we do, we may not be able to head out of Onahama on the 16th as scheduled but the Kuroshio came to our rescue. 82 more miles. As I was writing this it looks like the speed is dropping and we are down to 3 knots. We'll do what we have to do. Sailing is full of surprises, both good and not so good.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/12/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

Scary PYRAMID Waves

June 11, 2013.  1 pm
N 34.41 E 139.06
Weather: Raine
Winds: Northeast 22
Waves: 1m
12 miles west of Izuoshima

　It was really frightening! About 2 hours ago, at around Mikomotoshima in the Oshima Islands, the winds that were already up to 25 knots went up to 30 knots. The wave heights reached 2.5 - 3 meters. It's been pretty rough out here. Suddenly, I felt the Aeolus being lifted up then I felt it go sideways. At that moment, I heard the roaring sound of the engine. In the direction we headed to avoid a vessel were chopping pyramid waves. Hiki-san and Ando-san who were steering knew they were there but had to head in that direction to avoid a vessel. We just caught the edge of them but the thought of being caught in the middle of them sent chills down my spine. I experienced that during a open sea race in San Diego before and it was almost as scary. I'll tell you about my scariest experience some other time. So, why do we take such huge risks to do something like this? Well, my watch is going to start in a bit so I will write about that some other time too.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/11/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

VIDEOS!

June 9 Report from Kushimoto Shionomisaki-the southernmost tip of mainland Japan!

Come SAIL Away!

June 10 2013 (Sun) 6:30 am
N34.14 E137.28
Wave height 2 m
Wind 22 knots SSE
Cloudy skies.
Getting close to Enshunada

 Maybe it's because Typhoon Yagi formed in the Philippines and maybe because the weather front that was down by Kyushu is moving up, the wind and the waves are strong and the waves are rolling onto the deck. I went up to the mast to try to reef the sail and ended up getting covered with water and got soaking wet. It was so cold. Wind speeds got up to 28 knots. This has been a good lesson for our final training. It was a new moon last night so it was apparently very dark. Not that it makes much of a difference for me but I imagine to have to do things in the dark must make things stressful for the sighted. I went out to set up the sail in the middle of the night last night but it wasn't any different from doing it in the daytime. One of the perks of being blind. I'm happily singing an old Japanese pop song that I like to sing when I'm speeding away but I will be mindful of the fact there is a typhoon approaching. You might be curious about the song but just so you know, it's a really old song.

LIVE from the AEOLUS !

Hello Everyone!

This is a message from Blind Sailing Headquarters.

Live broadcast from the Aeolus will be aired on "Ce Matin! ZIP!" from June 10(Mon)to June 14(Fri)

　　Ce Matin! ZIP! from 5:20 am

See you then!

DAY RUN 113 Miles

June 9, 2013 1 pm.
Coordinate: N33.30 E135.58
Wind bearing 4 knots SSW.
Wave height 1 m
Cloudy with a little rain.
Heading 75 degrees from Kushimoto to south of Izuoshima with sails up.

Since we left Hokko Yacht Harbor at 1 pm, we've covered a distance of 113 miles (day run). We will be using nautical miles (x 1.85 km) in our blogs from now on. I thought it was around 100 miles so I was happy to learn we covered more than that. There is the Kuroshio Current in Kushimoto right off the Kii Hanto so we got up to 8.5 knots at one point. The wind was only around 6 knots so we were going faster than the wind. It will be around 200 miles to Kii Oshima. We should be making our approach in about 2 days. The low air pressure heading towards us from the west so we will try to escape east.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

POSTSCRIPT

Kinta no Daiboken-san

Thank you for your comment.

This is the last training (to Fukushima) with the 4 of us and from Fukushima, it will be just Hiro-san and I all the way to San Diego. 

Thank you very much for your support.

Originally posted by Jiro Shinbo in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

DAY 2

Good morning everyone.

I am aboard the Aeolus, sitting in front of a computer.

We did the overnight training aboard the Aeolus twice before and the first time I turned into a Merlion and was not in the condition to sit in front of a computer and the second time I was so busy trying to steer the yacht during my 2 hour watches that I couldn't think about anything else but it's funny how easily we humans get used to things if we train enough and it helped that the sea was very calm last night,I am able to sit in front of the computer on a rocking yacht typing away during my 2 hour off time. It's so true that "Practice Makes Perfect". 

Last night I had a gourmet meal, House Curry's "The Hotel" with a fresh egg in it. This morning we had gourmet boiled eggs that we boiled using sea water, croissants, tuna (from a can) and coffee for breakfast.I was worried that if we boiled eggs in sea water the eggs would get salty but it tasted like any other boiled egg. I wonder how they make those salt flavored boiled eggs they sell on the Shinansen. It's good to know that boiling eggs in sea water won't make it taste salty. Now we can conserve the purified water by using sea water. 

I will blog more often now so please look forward to it!

Oh, just a moment ago, Seiji Chihara came by on a boat to wish us luck.

Many others also come right up to us to wish us luck.

Thank you very much.

Jiro Shinbo

Originally posted by Jiro Shinbo in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

All 4 of the Crew are DOING WELL

June 9, 6:10 am.  Currently we are sailing through the waters of Hikigawa-cho. We have been sailing for 18 hours and we have covered 80 miles. Not a bad speed. Shinbo-san, me, Hiki-san and Ando-san from Kazi are all doing well. The wind is blowing from the direction we are heading in and the tide is going the other way too so we are struggling a bit. We should sail past Kushimoto around noon. I hope we can just ride out smoothly on the Kuroshio Current. (Current location N135.30 E135.23)

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

A HEARTFELT Send off from Osaka

June 8. The day is finally here. We will be leaving Osaka. After the sail out ceremony at 12 pm, I took the helm and headed out of Hokko Yacht Harbor around 1 pm. There were about 1000 people at the sail out ceremony to see us off. We also had a press conference so there were many people from the media. We were blessed with beautiful weather. I thank everyone who came to send us off in this heat. As we headed out Hokko Harbor, we saw many ships had come out there to see us off too. I think there were about 40 vessels out there. We continued to wave for over an hour, to try to convey how much we appreciate everyone's support. At Shinbo-san's home port, Tannowa, there were around 20 vessels to see us off. Thank you everyone, thank you very much. We will reach Tomogashima Suido in a little while. We will probably make it through at around 2 pm.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

LAST DAY of Prepping

June 7. Today was a Friday but the people of Kaientai took the day off from work to help load and do some maintenance work. It was a beautiful day, perfect for making preparations. In the morning, some professionals came to put our sponsers decals on the Aeolus. From the bottom of my heart, I thank all the sponsers for their support.
In the afternoon, we set up the iPad mini to connect with external speakers via bluetooth. As I wrote yesterday, the iPad will read aloud heading, speed and wind speeds. Now, I can leave the iPad mini to charge the battery in the cabin and listen to the information outside.  When all the maintenance and loading was done, we put a star on the end of the bow to express in appreciation to all the people who have support us and to pray that we will make it safely to San Diego. Tomorrow, we will be leaving Osaka.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/09/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

Refreshing HAIRCUT

Thank you reading the blog again today. June 6. I went to get my hair cut this morning. While we are out at sea, we won't be able to bathe, not even take a quick shower. We can only use 1 liter of water a day per person and that includes for cooking, drinking, brushing our teeth...everything. If we want to shampoo, we would have to save 1.5 liters of water. So we would be lucky if we are able to shampoo once a week. I'm worried if I will be able to survive such unsanitary conditions I've never experienced before. For this reason, I decided to get my hair cut as short as possible and went to the barber shop I talked about before. I've never mentioned to the barber that I was going to be sailing across the Pacific but he saw me on Ce Matin so he asked me a lot of questions as he cut my hair. I feel refreshed now that my hair is really short. Afterwards, I headed to the harbor and set up the iPad (all four including the backups) all with the same settings and tested them by connecting them to the LAN and the bluetooth speakers. I can change the settings on SailSound much smoother now. They fixed the 4th camera on the Aeolus. With this camera, it will be able to video us working at the bow of the ship and get some exciting footage of waves rolling in from the front. I hope you look forward to watching these videos on this website. Tomorrow will be our final day of prepping. I will do my best.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/07/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

A NEW SAIL

June 5. Before we went to the harbor, we went to Konan Pro to buy some tanks and things to make oil changes easier. Changing oil on a rocking Aeolus is no easy task. Hiki-san, who has crossed th Pacific before has thought of everything so that it would be as easy as it can possibly be for Shinbo-san. This morning I learned how to use the iPhone/iPad application called Ariadne. This is a navigation application developed for the blind. One of its functions tells you which direction and how far a certain point is when you set the coordinates. WOW. But I'm a very 'low-tech' guy so I was having trouble with the app. We called an IT expert for the blind and got some support. Whenever I have trouble with using a software and I can't figure it out myself I call him. Step by step I followed the setting instructions he sent me in an email and it finally worked. Thank you Sakamoto-san. I am very grateful for you continuous support. A new sail from Quantum was put on the Aeolus. Sails start to stretch over time. It makes sense because the wind that hits it is powerful enough to move a heavy yacht. The sail is put through a lot. When a sail is stretched out it loses its effect. This new sail has been fitted and newly made for the Aeolus so we will be able to take on the challenges of the Pacific. All the staff were busy installing a backup camera, setting up the backup NavNet, and they all worked late into the night. Back in the boathouse they explained how to use the emergency equipment, marked all the medical supplies with Braille and prepared the food for our trip to Fukushima. I am in awe at all the support the volunteers have given us. Only 2 more days left to prepare. We have been blessed with good weather. I will upload something again tomorrow so see you then!

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/06/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

EMERGENCY!

 What a huge shocker. Early last week as I was eating the lately popular teppanyaki Napolitan I bit into something really hard. I thought there was a rock or something in my past and looked at the hard item only to find that it was a piece of my tooth.

 I'm very adamant about my dental hygiene clean and I'm proud that I don't have any gum disease, I clean my teeth with dental floss and pricey toothpaste and lately I've started to use that dental water flosser you see on TV to clean between my teeth. So in no way did I expect something like this to happen and it boggled my mind. I hurried to my dentist and found out that a tooth on the upper right side had a cavity and it was that tooth that broke off.  

 The dentist said "You were lucky. If it broke 1 mm more, you would have severed a nerve and it would have been excruciatingly painful." 

 But I don't feel lucky at all. If this happened when we were on the Pacific, that would have been terrible. The dentist covered the tooth as an emergency measure but what if it comes off while we our at sea and the nerve gets exposed? I won't be in any condition to sail. Luckily, I was able to get a last minute appointment and I got the nerve removed. What a relief. So many unexpected things happen.

 I lost a lot of valuable time to load my things to the dental procedure but now we are down to 2 days and we have been able to load most of the necessities. Now all we do is wait for the wind.

 I am so excited...and a little nervous. After the tooth incident, who knows what will happen?  

Originally posted by Jiro Shinbo in Japanese on 6/05/2013
Translated by SWIS Project 

4 WATERPROOF BAGS of Clothing

June 4. Today I went to Nippon Lighthouse to get some Braille stickers and Braille writing machine this morning before going to the harbor. I wanted to label the bags that are filled with clothes and food. As soon as I got to the harbor, Shibo-san joined me for an interview with someone from the Kansai version of Yomiuri newspaper. Shinbo-san will be writing an article for them every week. I hope all of you living in Kansai will have a chance to read it! We checked each extra pieces of rope and we separated the ones that we will load onto the Aeolus and the ones we won't be taking with us. Ropes can get pretty heavy when they are long. I bunched up 5 pieces of rope and carried them on my back to the Aeolus but by the time I reached the Aeolus, I was exhausted. Now we have back ups for every type of rope in case any of them tear or breaks. I've been asked before if the ropes for the sails ever break and to be honest, they rarely do. However, we do have to be prepared for any situation. Safety comes first in this project so we are prepared for everything we can think of. It's a huge risk we are taking so I am so grateful that we have so many people working so hard for our survival. As I mentioned before, Helly Hansen has donated many things to our project. We have 5 different pairs for rain wear alone so I am certain we will be fine in any weather. We also got deck shoes, Tshirts, reefer jackets, pants, fleece and many many more. I touched everything to memorize the items so that I can easily find them during our trip across the Pacific.  I put the Tshirts and reefer jackets into ziplock bags and marked them in Braille. When I put them all into waterproof bags, it totaled to 4 bags and all of them are the same shape so for the ones I assume I will be opening and closing a lot, I marked them with a short piece of rope. This will help in identifying which bag has what quickly. By the time I got everything into the bags and left the harbor it was already around 9 pm. I am very grateful I was able to get everything I needed to get done today without incident. Only 3 more days until we head out of Osaka. Hiki-san is worried that there are still so many things left to be done. Please pray for us that we will be able to head out of Osaka smoothly and as planned. Thank you!

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/05/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

DONATION from Tannowa Yacht Club ～Jiro Shinbo Blog～

Hiro-san has already told you the story about when we were invited to my home port, Osaka Tannowa Yacht Harbor for the IFDS Blind Sailing World & International Championships 2013 awards ceremony last month and last month, the former chairman of the Tannowa Yacht Club visited us with his wife and daughters at Osaka Hokko Yacht Harbor where Hiro-san and I were training. With a donation of 200 liters of fuel. We are planning to load 600 liters of fuel on the Aeolus to generate power and we now have 1/3 of that. Thank you very much.

We have been busy loading the Aeolus for the last 3 days. 600 liters of fuel, 400 liters of water, this already adds up to a ton. It is already very close to the load line limit and the  exhaust pipe at the stern looks as if it will go underwater. We haven't loaded the ropes so we are expecting to sail out for San Diego with a load of approximately 1.5 tons to cross the Pacific.

At the beginning of the project, the whole thing didn't feel that real...but now, as we count down the days and make progress in our preparations, it's really starting to sink in. I know, it's about time!! But better late than never?

Originally posted by Jiro Shinbo in Japanese on 6/03/2013
Translated by SWIS Project 

Igarashi Yacht INSTITUTE

June 1. This morning I was live on air on Wake Up Plus. A taxi came to pick me up and took me to Yomiuri TV. During my ride to the TV station, the director updated me on what the segment I will be in will be like. I had my wife and daughter join me because it's not very often we get to go to a TV studio. As soon as we got the Yomiuri TV, we were shown to the waiting room where we met the Chief Producer and then we were shown to the make-up room. Just as I was about to say "Hey, I don't need any make-up." they explained to me that it was necessary to apply something on my face to prevent the light from reflecting off my face. That's good to know because a manly man from Kyushu would never wear make-up. LOL They let us into the studio early to show us around. This was going to be a nation wide broadcast so I was really nervous. I remember they were showing an interview with Prime Minister Abe on the screen but I can't remember a single thing about it. Later, they talked about issues like separate surnames for married couples and a Motorcycle race to be held on Osaka Castle grounds and finally it was time for th Blind Sailing segment.  During the commercials I said hello to the commentators and then stood before the camera. This segment was hosted by Igarashi-san and is called "Igarashi Yacht Kenkyujyo (Institute)". They will be airing this segment every week until we reach San Diego. I was at a loss for words when I found out that popular musicians like Yuzu and Motoharu Sano donated songs to this project. After they showed the video they took a few days ago on the Aeolus, I answered some questions and before I knew it, it was over. I spoke with the commentators for a bit before I headed back to my apartment because I had to prepare for a trip to Kumamoto for shooting of another TV show. My wife and daughter will be returning to San Diego tomorrow afternoon.  My daughter had a great time in Japan because she got to go to Disneyland and got birthday presents from her uncle and aunt. I went to Itami Airport with them so they can catch the flight to Narita where they will be changing planes for a JAL direct flight to San Diego. I took the JAL direct flight from San Diego to Narita to come to Japan and it really did feel like it was much more convenient and that Japan was much closer. I really hope JAL will continue offering these direct flights to Narita. I headed to Kumamoto with Igarashi-san (announcer) and Fujita-san (director). It was pouring when we got to Kumamoto. We took a taxi to Kumamoto Lighthouse, a place I spent 15 years since the 1st grade of elementary school. I commuted to blind school from here. Despite the heavy rain, 60 people gathered there for me. It made me feel really nostalgic to see all my old teachers and friends and we talked for 2 hours. Afterwards we headed to my hometown of  Ushibuka on Amakusa where we will be filming on location tomorrow. By the time we got there 3 hours later, we were all exhausted. Ushibuka is really really far. But as soon as I got out of the car, the air smelled like the sea, just like I remembered it and found myself unwinding immediately.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/03/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

WEATHER FORECASTS & Safe Voyages

May 31. This morning we had a fitting session for clothing. Helly Hansen has donated a huge amount of clothing such as deck shoes, boots, rain ponchos, fleece, t-shirts and many more to this blind sailing project. We are so grateful. Thank you very much. Now, we are ready for any kind of weather. When I mention that the quality of our attire affects our focus and performance out there, many people think I'm exaggerating but it's true. Say that it's raining and I'm freezing. It can get really difficult to focus on steering the yacht. If I were freezing, my mind would just keep wandering off to eating a warm cup of noodles. If I'm unable to concentrate, then there is that much room for human error. It is very important to be dressed appropriately for the weather to be able to sail the yacht safely. That is why we are so grateful for this donation from Helly Hansen because now we have attire for every weather imaginable. Afterwards, Mr. Numada from Osaka Electro-Communication University came to the Aeolus to test the new version of SailSound. This new version allows me to use the function that is already installed in the iPad mini to read out the information on the screen such as the heading, boat speed, wind direction, wind speed and such as many time as I set it to read out in a minute.  They also added the function where an alarm will go off is the LAN or NavNet has any issues and stops sending information. From 4 pm, I had a meeting with Baba-san at Yomiuri TV, something I have been looking forward to. Baba-san is a marine weather forecaster and he provides weather forecasts to all vessels on the water around the globe. Should a strong weather front or a low atmospheric pressure be approaching, he advises us a route that will be least affected by these weather conditions. Baba-san's deep knowledge and vast experience accumulated by assisting many vessels across the Pacific is very reassuring. He taught us some basic weather forecasting skills and gave us advice on what we should be prepared for from a weather forecaster's perspective. Being prepared for wind speeds to be at 15 m in 12 hours reduces our stress level considerably. And of course, knowing that Baba-san is looking out for us takes a load off our minds.  

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 6/03/2013
Translated by SWIS Project

GOODBYE KANSAI! Off we go to Fukushima!

Hello Everyone!                                                                                                             

This is a notice from the Blind Sailing Headquarters.

We only have a week before the blind sailing project we all have been working so hard on since last year will sets sail from Osaka. Hiro and Shibo-san have safely completed their sailing training and now all we can do is wait for the big day!

On June 8th, the two of them will say goodbye to everyone from Osaka Hokko Yacht Harbor and head for Fukushima Onahama Port.

We ask for your continued support as Hiro and Shinbo-san join forces to sail across the Pacific Ocean. Please come by to wish them luck!

Date:   June 8 (Sat) 12:00 pm

Place:  Osaka Hokko Yacht Harbor

            2-13-18 Tsuneyoshi Konohana-ku        

            http://www.osakahokko-yh.com/

*Please note that parking is limited so please check their website for maps and details for public transportation.

INTERVIEW with Wake Up Plus

May 30. Today we were interviewed for a TV show that airs every Saturday morning from 8 am called Wake Up Plus. This is a popular show that's hosted by Shinbo-san where many powerful politicians make appearances. Since last week they started airing a segment for Blind Sailing. This interview was for a broadcast on June 1. They wanted to capture some scenes with my family so my wife and daughter who has been in Osaka since the 26th joined me at the harbor. I wanted my daughter to learn more about the Aeolus so I hid toys and snacks throughout the ship and made it fun for her to make her own discoveries as she searched for them. She found things inside a bag for ropes, a box for propane gas, tool box and such and I think she had a really good time. Afterwards, Igarashi-san interviewed us. I'm curious to know what they will show in the broadcast. There were times when I sounded a little awkward. LOL I believe it will be aired between 8:30 am and 9 am. I will be making a live appearance. I know I will be nervous again but with help from Shinbo-san, I hope the I'll be OK. I hope you can watch it. And if you do, please post your comment! I will be looking forward to them. My older sister came from Kumamoto and I got handmade dolls (one of me, one of Shinbo-san and one of Aeolus) from a teacher that took very good care of me in elementary school. I the afternoon, I went sailing with the Wake Up Plus staff for about 2 hours. During our sailing trip, I tried to explain to Igarashi-san how I sharpen my senses when I am steering the boat but I'm not sure if I was able to explain well. It's so hard to explain things to people. I hope that I will eventually be able to talk about yachts with people who are unfamiliar with them as well as Shinbo-san can.    

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 5/31/2013
Translated by SWIS Project 

Koji Tele CHU!

May 29. I was standing by watching channel 10 this morning so I wouldn't miss the broadcast of my Ce Matin interview taken on May 20. Like I thought when I was on their show live, I am amazed at the director's creativity and skill to edits long interview footage into a short and concise video for perfect for broadcast. The scene where the weather caster Yukino-san was almost in tears when she was climbing the mast and the scene where Yoshida-san was cooking aboard the ship were done nicely. As soon as the broadcast was over, I left the house and headed for Osaka Station on the JR Loop Line. I met up with Hiki-san and went to Itami Airport where the Chief Producer for Yomiuri TV, Yuuki-san joined us and the 3 of us boarded the 7:40 flight to Fukushima. It was a small plane built for around 50 passengers and the weather was really bad so I was afraid that there would be a lot of turbulence but it turned out to be a smooth flight. As soon as we got to Fukushima Airport, we were greeted by Narita-san who has been a volunteer to support this project and Saito-san who is a representative teacher for the Iwaki Kaisei High School Yacht Club and headed for the City Hall for Iwaki City by car. We talked in detail with the representatives from the department of tourism of City Hall about the event that will be held on June 15 and 16 and how long we will be staying in Onahama . It made me think about how much work it is to plan and execute a major event and felt so much appreciation for everyone who has worked so hard to make this happen. We left City Hall and went to check out the area the Aeous will be docked. We talked about what we should do if the wind or waves were really strong on the day we leave and the route we should take to leave the port. Yuuki-san was also busy deciding where to place the cameras and where to park the broadcasting van. Then we had to hurry to Fukushima Chuo TV.  Here I was in a live broadcast TV show called Koji Tele Chu from 4 pm. I shared by thoughts about my previous visit to Minami Soma City with Director Isaki. I thought 4 pm was an unusual time for a live broadcast TV show and asked why but all I got was a simple reply that it used to be on at 5 pm. After the broadcast was over, we headed back to Osaka. Today was another productive day. So, if you are still curious about what Yoshida-san made for us aboard the Aeolus during the Ce Matin interview I'll tell you. It was an omelette. It was really delicious. It would be great if we could eat delicious omelettes everyday aboard the Aeolus but it would be difficult to take eggs with us on our voyage because although eggs stay fresh for a surprisingly long time, they are very fragile. So I enjoyed every bite of it.

Originally posted by Hiro in Japanese on 5/30/2013
Translated by SWIS Project