Today, the news is that the wind is north-easterly, around 15 knots. Not as bad as yesterday's 40 knots plus, which we would have been very foolish to venture out into. Never the less, we're leaving Miyazaki today, even though that 15 knots promises to be a head sea. The even worse news is that a typhoon is building in the Philippines, and it's heading this way. It seems the typhoon season - something our route and timing always planned to avoid like the plague - has started a month early.

Our hosts in Myazaki have been absolutely fantastic, and generous beyond belief. You couldn't imagine that you might meet a perfect stranger who introduces himself out of a common interest in boats, and end up staying and dining with him, and being shown around, all with so few words. We're even presented with some provisions to keep us going to Choshi. It's sad to say it, but I find it hard to believe you might encounter many people behaving like that at home. We're just a little too reserved and cynical. But Maretoshi is, to coin his own word, a shipmate. A very special one at that.

On Friday, we take a ride in Maretoshi's car to the port to retrieve some items from the boat. Then he takes us to a brand new marina. When we arrived on Thursday, we'd taken the first turning into Miyazaki's harbour entrance. If we'd carried on to the second one, we could have moored in a magnificent marina with full facilities instead of a commercial dock. But then we would never have met Maretoshi. That's fate, isn't it?

Miyazaki is known as a spa resort, and Maretoshi takes us to a Japanese spa. Located in another hotel, it consists of a number of baths of different temperatures. The traditional Japanese way is without a bathing costume, holding a small flannel as strategically as you like when moving from one bath to another.

It's bad form to use soap in the baths themselves, so you wander off to a separate area with showers, soap and shampoo to do the cleaning. Not forgetting the sauna, of course. By the end of it, we all feel warm, relaxed, and squeaky clean - wonderful!

We dine once more with Maretoshi, his wife and friends. They notice that this time we're not attacking the traditional dishes with quite the abandon we did on our first night, and before we know it, a bag full of cheeseburgers arrives.

So to Saturday morning, and time to say farewell. Once again, we would have loved to stay, but we're itching to move on. We still have another 14,700 miles left of our home run!

Clive Tully

Copyright Clive Tully ©2002
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