Kenichi Horie (born 1938) is a Japanese ocean adventurer and solo yachtsman from Osaka. In 1962, he departed from Nishinomiya in the 19-foot Mermaid and reached San Francisco after 94 days, completing the first known solo nonstop crossing of the Pacific Ocean by sailboat. He later undertook a solo nonstop circumnavigation and crossed oceans in vessels powered by solar energy, human effort, and waves, as well as boats constructed from recycled materials. In 2022, at the age of eighty-three, he sailed alone and nonstop from San Francisco to Japan, becoming the oldest person to complete such a Pacific crossing. His representative book, “Taiheiyō Hitoribotchi,” records the preparations, opposition, severe weather, navigational uncertainty, and daily decisions behind his pioneering 1962 voyage.
