At 1 p.m. I received a message on my cell phone from my husband: "I hope you're not sailing today. A typhoon is coming." Too bad I didn't see this message before we left Awajishima at 1:30 headed for Shodoshima. As a matter of fact, at 1 p.m., we were still sitting in an "onsen" overlooking the Seto Inland Sea practicing our math by counting the cars crossing the Naruto Bridge for 7,000 yen per shot -- one way. Besides, the sea had looked perfectly calm from the bath way up on that hill.

An hour later, however, the main sail was reefed to the No. 3 reef and the head sail to the No. 4. If you don't know what that means, consider yourself lucky to be a sofa sailor. Oncoming winds were blowing at 25 to 30 knots (45 to 55 kph) -- yikes -- with gusts of up to 38 knots (70 kph) -- double yikes -- and the boat was heeling to 45 degrees. For sofa sailers, 45 degrees would be enough knock you out of your sofa and onto the floor if someone came up from behind and tipped it. But at least you wouldn't have water running onto your sofa like we did into the boat. While waves crashed over the deck, the boat continued heeling -- and heeling, now 60 degrees. My stomach heeled too -- I was seasick.

Seasickness is a condition that requires all your mates to sail the boat for you while you attempt to calm down your insides, which are about to jump ship. And I'm not just talking about food. If my stomach lining decided to jump ship too, I would have to sail the rest of the trip without any stomach.