If a big wave came at the wrong moment, it would sweep me off into forty-eight-degree water, where I might last twenty minutes. Drowning quickly might be better.

There are a number of places on marine charts where even the most weathered sailors point and say, "Right there, nothing can go wrong. Everything has to go right." One place is the turbulent passage south of Cape Horn. Another is the dead center of the Indian Ocean.

I will never forget the feeling of walking into my home, a place that while drifting helpless in the middle of the Indian Ocean I wondered if I would ever see again.

But none of that kept me from picturing what a tsunami might look like if it did rise up and roar toward my little boat like some watery blue version of the Great Wall of China.

Fewer people have successfully solo-circumnavigated the globe than have journeyed into space.

The things that happen on the sea take you beyond yourself, beyond human capability.

I had begun to think that dreams are meant to be no more than dreams and that in reality dreams don't come true. Then my brother (Zac) left on his trip. It was amazing to see all the support that he got from around the world and to see how everyone worked together to help make his dream reality. Watching him do this really made me believe that I could too.