The locations visited by the expedition. Antonio de Vea's party reached a point slightly south of San Javier Island while the party of Pascual de Iriarte reached Evangelistas Islets at the strait of Magellan.
The Antonio de Vea expedition of 1675–1676 was a Spanish naval expedition to the fjords and channels of Patagonia aimed to find whether rival colonial powers—specifically, the English—were active in the region. While this was not the first Spanish expedition to the region, it was the largest up to then, involving 256 men, one ocean-going ship, two long boats and nine dalcas (Spanish: Piragua).[1][2] The expedition dispelled suspicion about English bases in Patagonia. Spanish authorities' knowledge of western Patagonia was greatly improved by the expedition, yet Spanish interest in the area waned thereafter until the 1740s.