who sailed around the cape of good hope in 1498
Bartolomeu Dias The expedition sailed south along the west coast of Africa. More provisions were picked up on the way at the Portuguese fortress of São Jorge de Mina on the Gold Coast. After having sailed south of modern day Angola, Dias reached the Golfo da Conceicão (Walvis Bay, in modern Namibia) by December. Continuing south, he discovered first Angra dos Ilheus, being hit, then, by a violent storm. Thirteen days later, from the open ocean, he searched the coast again to the east, discovering and using the westerlies winds - the ocean gyre, but finding just ocean. Having rounded the Cape of Good Hope at a considerable distance to the west and southwest, he turned towards the east, and taking advantage of the winds of Antarctica that blow strongly in the South Atlantic, he sailed northeast. After 30 days without seeing land, he entered what he named Aguada de São Brás (Bay of Saint Blaise)—later renamed Mossel Bay—on 4 February 1488. Dias's expedition reached its furthest point on 12 March 1488 when they anchored at Kwaaihoek, near the mouth of the Boesmans River, where a padrão—the Padrão de São Gregório—was erected before turning back.[5] Dias wanted to continue sailing to India, but he was forced to turn back when his crew refused to go further and the rest of the officers unanimously favoured returning to Portugal.[6] It was only on the return voyage that he actually discovered the Cape of Good Hope, in May 1488. Dias returned to Lisbon in December of that year, after an absence of sixteen months and seventeen days.[7]