After many delays and long negotiations, a new voyage was undertaken in to explore the outer coast of California as far as Cape Mendocino, locate good harbors that might be used as refuges for the Manila galleons, and find the supposed Strait of Anian, through which the English and French were rumored to have reached the Pacific.
A full complement of men, experienced navigators to advise the general, Vizcaino, two cosmographers, and a company of missionaries left Acapulco in three good vessels on May 5, Vizcaino explored the difficult coast of Lower California in the teeth of the heavy northwest gale that prevails on that coast almost the year round and reached San Diego Bay in November. After resting and refitting he sailed northward again and on Dec. With the two remaining vessels he pushed on up the coast to Cape Mendocino, which he reached on January 12, , missing San Francisco Bay in the bad weather.
At Cape Mendocino his expedition was found to be so badly battered that there were not enough hands to man the sails, and he decided to return.
On February 18, , he reached Mazatl n. This expedition, the first to make a scientific exploration of the west coast, furnished the first maps of that dangerous coast, did much to explode the myth of the Northwest Passage, and discovered Monterey Bay. Vizcaino strongly recommended the establishment of a port at Monterey for the protection and refitting of the Manila Galleons.
Winning some support, he went to Spain to plead his case before the Council of the Indies and received a royal decree establishing the port of Monterey with him in charge Meanwhile, however, a new viceroy in New Spain, the marquise of Montesclaros, opposed the plan on the grounds of expense and expediency, and the undertaking was abandoned for a hundred and sixty years.
By way of compensation, Vizcaino was put in command of an expedition to discover the fabulous islands, "Rica de Oro" and "Rica de Plata, " which were supposed to lie in the neighborhood of Japan.
The expedition sailed in , established the non-existence of the islands, made an ineffectual attempt to promote relations with Japan, and returned to Mexico in January In , Vizcaino was in the New Spanish province of Avalos, where he enlisted a force to defend the coast against Dutch attack.
Beyond that date nothing is known of him. He was the first person in recorded history to note certain ecological features of the California coast such as the Monterey cypress forest at Point Lobos. Vizcaino had married, sometime before , a woman of some property, and in , had one son. Looking for a job? After ten days charting the bay, the expedition continued north. From there two of the three boats proceeded further north.
The diary was published in Spanish in Carrasco and Francisco Guisasola, eds. This English translation is from Herbert Eugene Bolton, ed.
Douros, Basil S. Hughart, Kathy and Bill White. San Diego Historical Society. Bolton, Herbert Eugene editor. Spanish Exploration in the Southwest, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
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