Algoa Bay is an inlet in South Africa in the east of the former Cape Colony, 20 miles wide and 425 miles east of the Cape of Good Hope. It is the site of Port Elizabeth.

The Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias [1] was the first to reach Algoa Bay in 1488, where he planted a wooden cross on a small island now called St Croix or Santa Cruz island. He gave the bay a name meaning "Bay of the Rock", which was changed in Portugal to "Bahia de Lagoa" or Bay of the Lagoon, and which eventually became Algoa Bay.

The metropolitan municipality of Nelson Mandela Bay, which includes Port Elizabeth, is located on the shore of Algoa Bay. Algoa Flight Centre, named after the bay, is located at Port Elizabeth Airport.

Joshua Slocum talks about Algoa Bay in his book Sailing Around the World Alone:

The early Portuguese navigators, endowed with patience, were more than sixty-nine years struggling to round this cape before they got as far as Algoa Bay, and there the crew mutinied. They landed on a small island, now called Santa Cruz, where they devoutly set up the cross, and swore they would cut the captain's throat if he attempted to sail farther. Beyond this they thought was the edge of the world, which they too believed was flat; and fearing that their ship would sail over the brink of it, they compelled Captain Diaz, their commander, to retrace his course, all being only too glad to get home. A year later, we are told, Vasco da Gama sailed successfully round the "Cape of Storms," as the Cape of Good Hope was then called, and discovered Natal on Christmas or Natal day; hence the name. From this point the way to India was easy.

See also

• Bartolomeu Dias
• Nelson Mandela bay

Coordinates: 33°50′S, 25°50′E

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