Columbus Along Southern Coast of Cuba: On Second Voyage: mid-May 1494

This week there is news that the wreck of Columbus' pilot ship, the Santa Maria may have been found off the north coast of Hispaniola. The location and the remains seem correct to certain experts. Independent studies of the 15th century artifacts have begun.

On the 13th of May, in 1494, Columbus decided to return to what he thought was the mainland, i.e. Cuba. On the 14th his son tells us, they sailed north from Jamaica and after making Cabo de la Cruz [where there is now a lighthouse] they began heading north-west for a few days. According to his son's biography, the Admiral already was sick with an illness, poor food and no rest.

"As he followed the coast he was overtaken by a heavy thunderstorm with terrible lightning which put him in great danger. His difficulties were increased by the many shallows and narrow channels which he found, and he was compelled to seek safety from those two dangers which demanded opposite remedies. To protect himself from the storm he should have lowered the sails; to get out of the shallows he had to keep them spread. Indeed, if his difficulties had continued for eight or ten leagues he would never have escaped."

There was all these inlets and shoals that continued to make passage more difficult. But it was beautiful, full of birds and the peaceful locals were more attuned to their fishing than the big ships.

"Though they saw large trees on some, the rest were sandbanks which scarcely rose above water level. ... the nearer they came to Cuba the higher and more beautiful these inlets were. Since it would have been useless and difficult to give a name to each one, the Admiral called them collectively El Jardin de la Reina. But if they saw many islands that day, they saw even more on the next and they were on the whole bigger than those they had sighted before.... That day they sighted as many as 160 of these islets, which were divided by deep channels through which the ships sailed." [p. 173]

There were cranes like in Spain, but red. There were sea turtles and those hatching from eggs then, crows, goosanders, sweet-singing small birds and lovely scents that "... seemed to be in a rose garden full of the most delightful scents in the world."

Some locals were fishing with remora, or suckerfish that attach themselves to other aquatic life. The sailors were so intrigued they waited for the locals to end fishing and then invited them aboard ship. They would have given them anything, Columbus' son tells us, but they had little with them but fish.  The Admiral gave them some small objects and they went away happy. But the ships were running out of food and Columbus wondered if they could go much further.
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quotes, pagination from: The Four Voyages, Christopher Columbus, edited, translated and with an introduction by JM Cohen, 1969 and for The Penguin Group, London,