A tranquil day on the tropical South Atlantic provides opportunity for relaxation, reading and reflection. We enjoy a welcome respite between watching whales cavort and perform for our pleasure yesterday and the hectic pace we can anticipate for the next two days in Rio.
For some of us, it is a chance to celebrate the important anniversary we are sharing: this week marks a 500-year anniversary of Portuguese exploration of this region. Our expedition retraces much of the voyage of geographical exploration to this coast ordered by King Manoel of Portugal. To follow up Cabral’s brief visit a year earlier, three caravels under the command of Goncalvo Coelho, but also including the Florentine merchant, Amerigo Vespucci, spent several months here in 1501 and 02. They discovered and named several important places: All Saints’ Bay, (we saw their landing place in Salvador, 500 years since their landing; Baie de Reis, – what is now Guanabara Bay, the harbor of Rio de Janeiro – named for the religious festival of the Three Kings, January 6th; and the huge estuary of what would be later called the River Plate. Two nights ago we passed Porto Seguro, where Pedro Alvares Cabral claimed the land of Vera Cruz for his King – this land would become Brazil. It was from Vespucci’s reports of his historic voyage that in 1507 a German cartographer, Martin Waldseemuller, gave the name “America” to the new lands in mistaken honor to Vespucci. The only remaining copy of Waldseemuller’s map -– now called “America’s Birth Certificate” -– has recently been acquired by the Library of Congress for a record $10 million! Our voyage is indeed, linked to highly significant, historic events.
After Suzana gave us a fast-paced tour of Brazilian history and an introduction to the local sign language, we were treated to an open-air barbecue on the pool deck. It was interrupted, briefly, by the call to watch the sunset’s green flash.
