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Leif Eriksson was sailing and got blown of course by a storm and landed in North America. He then became the first European to reach North America.
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He was the prince of Portugal and he founded a school for exploring and he also studied navigation. On his exploration he traveled southern to Gambia on the western coast of Africa.
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Hernando Cortes went on an exploration to northern Mexico where he came in contact with the powerful Aztecs. He and his men began to gather local towns to help them with their attempt at conquring the Aztecs. Witht he weaponry advantage Cortes and his men won the battle defeating the Aztecs.
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Bartholomeu Dias became the first person to sail around the southern tip of Africa opening the way for many other sailors to make larger expositions.
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Christopher Columbus traveled across the Atlantic Ocean to try to find new land. He ended up finding an unfamiliar continent that we know today as the Americas. This made everybody else jealous making them travel to the new world as well.
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Vasco De Gama successfully sailed down and around the southern tip of Africa and came up to southern India. Making him the first person to sail fully down and around the southern tip of Africa.
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John Cabot was an Italian sailor that sailed for the English and his exploration's goal was to find a passage way to the Pacific from the coast of Canada. He ended up finding New Finland.
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Amerigo Vespucci explored the eastern coast of South America mapping it out.
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Juan Ponce de Leon sailed to present- day Florida and he mapped and discovered most of Florida.
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Balboa crossed Central America to discover the Pacific Ocean. His voyage included climbing over mountains and canyons to find the sea. He ended up dying because his head got cut off.
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Ferdinand Megellan believed that he could sail around the New world to find the spice islands. He had a long and treturous journey and then they finally found them. Some of his men including him died but his belief became a reality.
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Alvar Nunez Cabeza da Vaca was an explorer who explored the western part of North America in search of the seven cities of gold.
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Francisco Pizarro one day noticed that the Inca empire must have been extremely wealthy because he and his men saw them throwing gold into the river as if wasting it. Seeing this made him want to get the gold and silver that they must not care about. He took the leader as hostage and they gave him the gold and silver and he ended up killing the leader anyway.
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Jacques Cartier was a frenchman who sailed all the way down the Lawrence river to present-day Montreal. Gaining claims for France.
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Hernando de Soto explored some of Florida and North Carolina and also moved west to find the Mississippi River.
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Fransico Vasquez de Coronado explored most of the southwest America to search for the cities of gold but instead ended up finding the Grand Canyon.
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Juan Rodriguez was one of the first people to map and explore west america and even ventured up into southern parts of Canada
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Samuel de Champlain known as the Father of New France explored the st. lawrence river getting many claims.
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Henry Hudson led a Dutch exploration which led to them finding present-day New York.
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Henry Hudson led an expedition up into Canada where him and his men found some of Leif Erickson's findings. His crew mates grew tired of him and marooned him leaving him to die.
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Rene-Robert de La salle explored a ton of land in more central america getting many claims on the Mississippi river.
