 After King Manuel I of Portugal refused to support his plan to reach India by a new route, by sailing around the southern end of the South American continent, he was eventually selected by King Charles I of Spain to search for a westward route to the Maluku Islands (the "Spice Islands").Commanding a fleet of five vessels, he headed south through the Atlantic Ocean to Patagonia.Despite a series of storms and mutinies, they made it through the Strait of Magellan into a body of water he named the "peaceful sea" (the modern Pacific Ocean).