Christopher Columbus, a Genoese navigator in the service of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, set sail on his first voyage on August 3, 1492 from the port of Palos de la Frontera, in the province of Huelva, Spain.
Columbus made a route that took him to the Canary Islands, where he stopped to resupply. He then continued his journey west across the Atlantic Ocean. After about two months of sailing, on October 12, 1492, Columbus reached what we know today as America, specifically one of the islands in the Bahamas archipelago that he called San Salvador.
Columbus explored several other islands in the Caribbean during this first voyage, including Cuba and Hispaniola (now divided between Haiti and the Dominican Republic), before returning to Spain in March 1493. His route was innovative for the time, as he was seeking a new route to Asia by sailing west.