Li Guoyong set out from Daming to South America, there will be two routes, one is to directly enter the Pacific Ocean from the East China Sea, across the entire Pacific Ocean, the whole journey is about 37,800 miles, but he must first go to the West Coast countries of South America such as Peru or Colombia, and then land, and go to Brazil by land.

The distance was extremely long, and there was a long period of time without supplies, which was quite difficult in this era.

Of course, he could go to North America, about 20,000 miles, and find supplies in the United States and Mexico, and then go to South America, but it would be estimated to be more than 40,000 miles.

And no matter whether he goes to the United States or Peru, he can't land directly in Brazil, he needs to land from other countries and then cross, because the Panama Canal has not yet been opened at this time.

Crossing the Pacific Ocean is too dangerous in this era.

So Li Guoyong took the second route, first to Malacca, then from Malacca, to Africa, after passing the Cape of Good Hope, from Africa across the Atlantic, directly to the coast of Brazil to land.

The total length of this route is about 33,000 li, and the advantage is that the front all the way to Malacca, nearly 10,000 miles of the road are under the control of the Ming army, and can be effectively supplied, and the eastern part of the state is a place where Zheng He and Liu Baihu have been, and they are relatively familiar.

With the thunderous shouts of joy on the shore, the South America slowly left the harbor with three other ships and galloped towards the East China Sea.

After Zhu Gaochu ascended the throne, he attached great importance to shipbuilding technology, and also set up a special Ministry of Education and Science and Technology, and the relevant technical departments were reorganized many times, gathering the country's top shipbuilding craftsmen, and then opened a university of science and technology to encourage private innovation and use it for heavy rewards.

In the ninth year of Hongxi, the Ministry of Science and Technology Craftsman Bureau tried the hollow bow sailboat, the hollow bow is the symbol of the flying clipper ship in later generations, the hull has a small freeboard, and the superstructure is less, so as to ensure the stability of the ship and give full play to the role of the sail.

This kind of ship in later generations, because the ship is almost close to the surface of the water sailing, the aspect ratio is generally greater than 6:1 its underwater shape is designed to the minimum resistance rest, in order to increase the speed, but maintain a certain lateral resistance profile, resulting in the waterline is particularly beautiful, and even in the first waterline surface has a concave, long and sharp curve scissor type head column is a situation suitable for racing, in the sea can split the wave (cut the wave) to reduce the wave resistance, so it is called flying shear.

But now what Daming has built can only be regarded as sub-flying scissors, and it has not yet reached the speed of later generations.

At the peak of the 19th century, clippers sailed at speeds of 12-14 knots per hour (about 50 miles) and crossed the Atlantic Ocean from Europe in 12 days.

At this time, among the four ships used by Li Guoyong, the smallest 400-material ship Suzhou, was the new AFAB clipper he bought.

The imperial court has just developed and promoted, because the load capacity is slightly lower, the merchants are not very important at present, but Li Guoyong bought one, which was to support the promotion of the imperial court, and later used it and found that it was very good, stable and fast.

His fleet was about 6 knots (22 miles) per hour downwind, and sometimes down to 3 knots or even 2 knots in upwind, averaging 10 knots per hour.

Li Guoyong walked very smoothly in front, and all the way over was the territory of the Ming army, and supplies could be supplied everywhere.

He set off on the sixth day of the second lunar month, stopping and going, and the girls on the boat in front of him did not need it, and every time he went ashore, he asked the sailors and his fellows to take turns to go to the local Red House to play.

In early April, after more than a month, his fleet arrived in Malacca.

Li Guoyong has followed his father many times in the past to run the Nanyang route, and he mainly goes to Jiaozhi more, this is the first time to come to Malacca.

On the same day, the fleet landed at the port of Malacca, and Li Guoyong was very shocked after going up.

There is a bazaar a hundred steps away along the coast, there are shops on both sides, Ming people, local people, Yue people, foreigners, all kinds of skin colors, among which there are many Ming people, and it is quite obvious, all the shops opened by Ming people, are in front of the store into forty-five degrees, there is a dragon flag of the Ming Dynasty, it is said that the emperor personally designed.

There are various incentives for Ming people to open shops, including shop rent and tax rate, so many Ming people have been encouraged to come to Malacca.

As Li Guoyong knows, in the Suzhou area, five years after Hongxi, a large number of businessmen came to Malacca to set up shops, and some even emigrated with their families, and the imperial court took special care of them.

Li Guoyong asked Liu Baihu to take everyone ashore to rest and eat, and he directly found the local Jinyi Guard.

Malacca also has a thousand households of Jinyi Wei, and Li Guoyong took out the book of the imperial court after coming to the door, indicating his identity, and he went to South America to find rubber seeds.

The local Qianhu was not in the Yamen, and there was a deputy Qianhu who received him personally, and when he saw him, he shouted: "Brother has courage, I admire my brother like this." ”

Daming sea trade has been quite developed, because along the road are the territory of the Ming army, now it is very simple to travel to and from Jiangnan and Nanyang, even so, there are not many people who dare to go to Africa and the Americas.

In places such as Beijing and Suzhou, there are often people who send rubber seeds, basically trying to cheat money, and the imperial court has punished a lot of crimes, and there are still people who do this.

This Qianhu surnamed Chang has been in Malacca for three years, and has only seen eighteen fleets passing through here, some of which are going to Africa to pan for gold, and some are going to the Americas to find rubber seeds, but according to him, they have not succeeded so far.

A few batches came back in the middle, and all of them suffered heavy losses.

Li Guoyong was also a little flustered when he heard this, but immediately told himself that his ship was big, there were few people, the supplies were abundant, and he was well prepared.

Chang Qianhu asked him what he needed to supply, and the Jinyi Guard could coordinate, including broken artillery and missing shells.

But Li Guoyong came all the way to the territory controlled by the Ming army, and there were no pirates, and the artillery and ammunition were not used, so he came here to ask about the situation.

I learned from the mouth of the surname Chang that the people who went to the Americas before were basically not rich businessmen in the Ming Dynasty, because ordinary rich businessmen didn't want to work so hard, they had money and a good life, who was willing to work as hard as Li Guoyong,

Most of the people who went to Africa and the Americas to pan for gold were poor boat people, or small merchant families, who wanted to make a profit.

Chang Qianhu has seen the largest sea ship only a thousand materials.

He was shocked to hear that Li Guoyong had brought 3,000 sea boats, which were still of a new type, and he felt that Li Guoyong had a greater chance of coming back safely, not to mention whether he could find rubber seeds.

"Li Dong's family has a big ship, even if it doesn't work, there is no problem coming back, as long as you don't get lost." Chang Qianhu finally signed his book.

After resting in Malacca for two days, replenishing fresh water and grain, and bringing a lot of fresh local fruits, Li Guoyong continued his journey and arrived at Yaji Port three days later.

This is the last province set up by the Ming Dynasty in Sumatra, Aceh.

It was also the last Ming stronghold to enter the Indian Ocean.

Li Guoyong went ashore to resupply, and then continued on his way.

This time, I sailed at sea for more than 20 days, and in early May, I came to Zhenghe Island.

Zhenghe Island is the Maldives in later generations.

In the sixth year of Hongxi, Zheng He was ordered by Emperor Zhu Gaoxu to occupy the Maldives on the way to Africa, and left 108 Ming troops to set up Zheng He's 100 households, and named the Maldives Island Zheng He Island to show his commendation.

There are more than 100 Ming soldiers on Zhenghe Island, one person from 100 households, and two people from 100 deputy households.

The Ming army stored fresh water on the island, cultivated fruit, and cultivated a small amount of land for self-sufficiency, which was replenished every three months in Aceh Province.

At present, the supply is relatively far, and it will take more than 20 days, but in the next step, Zhu Gaochu will take India and Sri Lanka in the future, and then it will not only be easy to supply, but also can get supplies from Sri Lanka.

Li Guoyong went to the island here to get rest and fresh water, and when the local hundreds of households heard that they were going to South America, they specially provided them with some food.

In the end, Baihu told them that this was the last stronghold of the Ming Dynasty overseas, and you should take care of yourself in the future.

Li Guoyong was very moved.

On the fourth day of the fifth lunar month, Li Guoyong set sail again and headed for Africa.

(End of chapter)