Christopher

C!umbus
1492-1493
—The first voyage
 To the one who read this, you might or might not realize
me whether in a good or bad way. Well, I’m Christopher
Columbus, the smartest explorer and navigator! I was born
to a middle-class family in 1451 in the Republic of Genoa,
Italy which was a city well-known for explorers. As my dad
owned a restaurant here, I always helped him until I turned
20 years old. The customers who came mostly were
navigators; they usually talked about their adventures and
compared who had gone the farthest. They would be so
proud if they had visited the place that others had never been
to. Every time I heard these kinds of conversation, I felt
interested and wanted to be a clever navigator like them.
After this period of time, I decided to quit working and
followed my dream instead. I disappeared from Genoa
without anyone knowing for several years. Later on, I met
the King of Spain who offered me a job as a merchant ship.
 I remained at sea until 1470, when French privateers
attacked my ship as it sailed north along the Portuguese
coast. The boat sank, but I floated to the shore on a
scrap of wood. However, I had found a new ship right
after and made a trip to Iceland. It was my belief that
Iceland was located at the edge of the world and I could
fall from this if I continued going. This sounds frightening
but challenging at the same time. Nonetheless, I made a
decision to take this risk and continued going. When I
arrived there far enough; I still not fall from the earth. I
was happy that I still alive but after all, I finally made
my way back to Lisbon, Portugal where I studied
mathematics, astronomy, cartography and navigation.
And here is how my idea … to start to hatch a plan that
would change the world forever began.
 This journey made me realize the way how people
believed that our planet was flat and limited was wrong. In
1479, when I was at the age of 28, I married a Portuguese
woman, Felipa Moniz Perestrelo who came from a semi-
noble family with useful maritime connections. Her father
collected so many books about navigation as he used to be one
of the brightest navigators before working as a government
officer. After the marriage, I took this opportunity to go
learn new stuff in my wife’s father library until I had gained
lots of knowledge. One day, there was a navigator who
came and told me his story about how his journey was farther
than others in the west but ended up with an accident.
Luckily, he was alive and be able to make his way back.
From my point of view, according to this story, I believed
that there must be a way farther to the west in which travellers
could travel without falling from the planet.
 To make this be proven, I wrote a letter to the
geographer in order to express my opinion and ask for
advices. Later on, I got the answer from him “If we
navigate heading to the west, we will be possible to get to
the eastern city faster and within a shorter period of time.”
After receiving this answer, I felt more confident and be
ready to start my journey again. To travel through the sea
to the place where I had never been, a nice and big ship
was needed. One of the biggest problems was I couldn’t
afford it as it required tons of money. After all, I decided
to ask King John II, King of Portugal for help but he
was not interested. The way I thought that the world was
round seemed to be crazy when viewed by others.
Subsequently, I informed my intention to the King of
Spain again.
 As could be expected, he turned thumbs down because the
philosopher had already diagnosed that God determined the
planet to be flat. In this point, I felt so tired as no one
believed me, however; giving up would never going to be my
option. While later, I took a trip to England and France but
then, I had been rejected again. Well, I was getting poorer
and poorer right now as I quit my job and only focused on this
journey. To make matters worse, my wife passed away. As
you could realize, I had nothing left: money, family, friend,
supporter. The only place I could think of where food and
shelter were provided was the temple so … I went and stayed
there for a while. At a later time, I lucked out and met a
beautiful young Spanish lady who was Ferdinand’s favorite
person. I was not hesitate to tell her my belief how the earth
was round and surprisingly, she trusted me!
 Due to the fact that something made Ferdinand want to
experiment my insane belief, he asked me to go meet him.
Right after I got this command, I went there and finally, he
offered me a nice ship and funds for the journey. In addition,
we made the agreement in which that during my trip---
whatever riches I found--- he would own 90% of them and the
rest which was 10% would be mine.

And here I came, after spending several years trying to

convince someone to pay for my journey! Finally, I was able
to persuade Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain
to pay for the trip. Before I got going, my crew and I set the
objectives of this voyage together which was to sail west until we
reached Asia (the Indies) where the riches of gold, pearls and
spice awaited. Well, I got everything I needed and I was so
excited for my trip to begin. I could not wait xx
 August 3rd, 1492: My journey to India started now,
along with the three ships named the Nina, the Pita and the
Santa Maria. Vicente Yanez Pinzon was the captain of the
Nina while Martin Alonso Pinzon and his brother was
responsible for the Pita. At the same time, my son and I took
the control of the Santa Maria, the biggest one among these
three. Here are the crews list of each ship:

Crew of the Nina:

• Vincente Yanez Pinzon, captain
• Juan Nino, owner and master
• Bartolome Roldan, apprentice pilot
• Alonso de Morales, carpenter
• Bartolome Garcia, boatswain
• Juan Arias, cabin boy
• Maestre Alonso, physician
• Miguel de Soria, servant
• Sancho Ruiz, pilot
Crew of the Pinta:
• Martin Alonso Pinzon, captain
• Francisco Martin Pinzon, master
• Cristobal Garcia Xalmiento, pilot
• Cristobal Quintero, ship's owner
• Garcia Hernandez, steward
• Maestre Diego, surgeon

Crew of the Santa Maria:

• Cristobal Colon (Christopher Columbus), captain-general
• Juan de la Cosa, owner and master
• Pedro de Gutierrez, royal steward
• Rodrigo de Escobedo, secretary of the fleet
• Rodrigo Sanchez, comptroller
• Diego de Salcedo, servant of Columbus
• Luis de Torres, interpreter
• Antonia de Cuellar, carpenter
• Bartolome Garcia, boatswain
• Cristobal Caro, goldsmith
• Diego Perez, painter
• Juan Sanchez, physician
• Pedro de Terreros, cabin boy
• Pero Nino, pilot

 August 6th, 1492: One of the ship spars was broken.
From my point of view, I thought that it was my crews’
intention as they didn’t want to take this risk anymore.

September 9th, 1492: Our voyage was now 10 lea far but
I recorded the distance less than this as I didn’t want my crew
to be afraid and gave up. The more distance we go, the more
my crew will get scared.

September 10th, 1492: I made an announcement to my

crew that we were now 48 lea away from where we started but
in fact, it was 60 lea!

September 15th, 1492: Sea waving, wind blowing!! In

the early evening, we saw the light straight from the sea which
made all of my crew got scared.
 September 16th, 1492: We observed that some grass and
green leaves were floating on the sea. This ensured us that
either an island or coast was located not far away from where
we were.

September 17th, 1492: The sea water was less salty than
usual. My crews were so glad and happy as they believed that
it was shallow-water. The boat sailed faster and faster. Our
destination was not far from here, we were almost there!

September 23th, 1492: The ship continued sailing west,

seemed to be far away from the destination. My crew was now
becoming restless and irritated. One of them said “Sir, why
did the wind always flow west and never changed to other
directions?” It had been so long struggling in this ship without
seeing any trace to land. Could we return back to Spain as
soon as possible? Otherwise, we would fall from this planet.
 September 25th, 1492: I was very happy at first as
I saw an island besides the sea; it literally turned out to
be just a mirage. I was so disappointed xx

October 3rd, 1492: All of my crews threatened me in

the fact that they would toss me away through the sea if I
was still going and not returning back to Spain. Well,
the only thing I could do at that time was to change the
compass from west to east in order to spoof all my crews
and continued going.

October 6th, 1492: My crew was becoming more

and more aggressive but they finally calm down at the
end. No matter what happened, the journey was still
going on! Way to goooo!
 October 10th, 1492: From my perspective, we came to the
point where it was far enough from the beginning. I trusted on
myself and my journey in which that we will reach the
destination within three days. Thus, I decided to take the risk
and told my crew that if the land was found in the next three
days, we would return back to Spain immediately with no
condition. I was kind of a little bit risky right now but I was
glad to see all my crews hopeful.

October 11th, 1492: At the end of the day, we saw the

light coming from the edge of the sea--- an unknown island---
I made a guess to my crew that we will reach our destination
within one day.

October 12th, 1492: Here we came! It was only two

hours past midnight of today. The land was sighted by
Rodrigo de Triana, a Pinta’s sailor.
 From this point, I still could not believe that I had
came to the point where the land was spotted. Even though
I was not sure which city was it; one thing I did know was
that it was not neither China nor Japan. As I had read
Marco Polo's article, it indicated the skin color of these two
nations which were not tanned. On the other hand, the
people here had kind of the mixture of tanned and reddish
skin color so I decided to name them as the “Indians."

October 13th, 1492: Here was a small island, my first

landfall which I was going to name it as "San Salvador."
Furthermore, I met the natives here whom I called the
Indians; I started trading fruit and tools with them. I felt
a little bit guilty at first as I kidnapped and asked them to
be a guide for us. All in all, it was very helpful ha.
 October 23th, 1492: It had been two full weeks
already! I still got stuck in this place and used the natives to
be my guide to find India. During these days. I went to the
new three islands, named it to be relevant to me as Santa
Maria de la concepcion, Ferdinandina and Isabella.

October 28th, 1492: After using the natives to guide

me, we finally arrived Cuba! In order to prove where exactly
this place was, whether India or not, I sent two of my crews
to investigate--- Rodrigo de Jerez and Luis de Torres. I
asked them to find the emperor of India but the mission was
failed. After all, I explored around this place and finally
went to visit a small village. Interestingly, I had an
opportunity to observe the smoking of tobacco; it made me
cough continuously but still, I wanted more and not hesitate
to pick another one! We were trading stuffs and having fun
together! What a memorable day!
 Nvember 22nd, 1492: MartÃn Alonso Pinzón,
captain of the Pinta, deserts the expedition off Cuba
without permission. He behaved this way as the native
guides said that the Babeque island had tons of riches; thus
he sailed his own search to the island I had mentioned.
However, I didn't care and still, continued my exploration
with my two remaining ship: Nina and Santa Maria.

December 5th, 1492: After leaving Cuba, I made a

new landfall once again on the island of Hispaniola. It
was called Haiti by my native guides, however; I would
rename it as La Espanñola.
 December 25th, 1492: The starting of today was
amazing; but there were some serious problems we had to face
at the end of the day. The Santa Maria’s flagship sank off
Hispaniola which made us have to abandon this ship. Yet, I
was not giving up and finally came up with an idea to use the
remaining materials from the ship to build a fort on the shore,
named it as La Navidad. Well, the problems were still
coming, the ship was a lot smaller than the Santa Maria
which could not hold all of my remaining crews. I decided to
leave 43 of my crew behind. Before I left, I made a promise
with them in terms of making them staying here in this island
with the native people and I would be back to pick them up
right after I came back from Spain. To the deep of my
heart, I didn't expect this to happen and I knew what did it
feel like when you were left behind but it was the only option I
could think of.
 January 2nd, 1493: Here we came to the day in which
everyone was waiting--- our journey back to Spain began. I was
very excited to go back and tell the good news to King Ferdinand
and Queen Isabella as they were waiting for us!

January 6th, 1493: During my journey along the coast of

Hispaniola, I was surprised to see Pinzón again! To be honest, I
felt very angry at first but something made be felt relieved as he
asked me to rejoin the trip. As could be expected, I definitely said
yes to him!!!

January 16th, 1493: In the early morning, we departed from

Hispaniola with our remaining ships---Nina and Pinta--- heading
back to Spain. Unexpectedly, we had to travel through the violent
storm and heavy rain. Everyone got so scared; it was horrible. In
this situation, it was so difficult to control the ship as the thunder
continued flashing to the water. Due to this occurrence, the Pinta
ship started fading away which I could not see anymore. The Nina
and Pinta ship separated again because of the fierce storm.
 February 14th, 1493: It had been two weeks already,
sailing this boat alone without the Pinta ship. I didn’t know
what exactly happened to the people there but hoping they were
still alive. I had two ideas going on my mind at the same time:
one was to find the Pinta and the other was to continued my
voyage. As I took my time considering, I decided to go back
because the King and Queen were still waiting for us.

February 15th, 1493: On our way back at some point, the

Santa Maria Island in the Azores was sighted by us.

March 4th, 1493: My remaining crews and I arrived

Lisbon, Portugal. Everyone was so excited! Our home was
not far from here, we were almost there!
 March 14th, 1493: Here we came, we finally
reached the destination!! Our journey was
successful! I arrived my home town at Palos,
Spain. I was very happy and excited to let the
King and Queen know my good news. It was
such a warm welcoming in which I had never felt
before. I gave all the notes I had lectured, the
route I had travelled and most importantly, the
things I had traded and captured. After telling
what had happening to me during my trip, they
gave me the total of 17 ships for my later voyages.
 Here we came to the end of my first journey. I
was so proud and had so much fun to be able to
pursue my true dream. I was not hesitate to make
more and more voyages until I could find the new
world. During my trip, I had some difficulties in
dealing and arguing with my crews, trying to
persuade them in trusting myself. There were so
many obstacles and problems we had to face, but we
finally could get through all of them. Nevertheless, I
was glad thinking how I had discovered a shortcut
to Asia across the Atlantic Ocean. This was
something I would treasure forever and I would
never forget my year 1492-1493. What an amazing
discovery I had made!