Juan de Fuca was a Greek-born sailing pilot living in Venice but sailing out of Mexico for Spain who claimed all of the western North American continent as theirs. In those days you laid claim to whatever land you heard about, and then raced off to be the first to document what you claimed.
Around 1586, an English pirate raided the ship Juan de Fuca was on, taking everything in it. de Fuca eventually ended up back in Venice to tell the story of a vast strait between latitudes 48 and 49, but he had no records. Perhaps this was the entrance of a passage to the Atlantic or Hudson’s Bay. He told his story in 1592.
Many explorers looked for this strait to no avail. The threatening coastal features of high tides, rocks, and weather kept the “Northwest Passage” concealed for 200 years.
In 1790 Manual Quimper found the entrance to the Strait, sailed a short distance into it, and claimed the land for the King of Spain. He got as far as today’s Port Townsend before turning back.
In 1792, George Vancouver conducted a concise survey of the Strait, Puget Sound (Peter Puget was his navigator), the San Juan Islands, and then circumnavigated Vancouver Island. When he entered the Straits, he sought refuge for repair and resupply in a favorable little bay, which he named Discovery Bay after his ship. He, of course, claimed the land for the King Of England.
Vancouver basically proved that this was not the Northwest Passage. For 200 years the nations of Italy, Spain, Portugal, England, and Denmark had searched for this fabled passage. If found, the spoils would be empire and riches beyond thinking.
in 1872, almost a hundred years later, the San Juans would be declared American, Vancouver Island British.