Manilla Galleon in the North Pacific.
1565.

Watercolor 14" x 21"


In 1519 the Spanish founded the city of Panama which was to become the center of their naval operations on the Pacific Coast for the next three centuries. The incredible wealth of the Inca had rescued the Spanish Crown from bankruptcy and financed their expanding empire. More importantly for the later expansion into the North Pacific, it allowed her to establish several naval bases on the Pacific Coast from which treasure galleons from Manilla to Mexico made regular annual voyages. At first the Spanish had no understanding of the wind circulation in the Pacific Ocean, and the ships from Manilla had returned directly to Spain instead of fighting to windward against the steady trades. But in 1565, under the direction of Andres de Urdaneta, the fleet leaving the Philippines sailed north until they came to the latitude of the northwest trades and rode these strong steady winds back to Mexico. A defector from the fleet, Alonso de Arellano, actually made it back to Acapulco first using Urdaneta’s information, but the honour of solving the puzzle of the wind patterns was rightly bestowed on Urdaneta. For the next 250 years the treasure galleons followed this route, sailing east between 30 and 45 degrees north until they came up with the North American continent, then following it south to Acapulco.