Balboa, Vasco Nunez de
From Encyclopediak
Balboa, Vasco Nunez de (1475-1517), the discoverer of the Pacific Ocean, born in Spain. He came to America at the age of 25 and explored the southwestern coast of the Caribbean Sea. In 1513 he set out from Darien to find the gold of Peru and the ocean beyond the mountains. On Sept. 25 he saw the waters of the South Sea, and four days afterward took formal possession of it in the name of the King and Queen of Castile.
