while Diogo Fernandes Pereira sailed north, presumably to Malindi, to see if he could catch up with the Albuquerques. However, this hypothesis rests almost fully on a report, from Albuquerque, that, on his return, he found a note (or notes?) at São Brás reporting that both Ravasco and the ship of Setubal (i.e. Fernandes) had been there. Whether it was one note (both together) or two separate notes (left separately) is unclear. Most authors (e.g. Theal (1902: 163)) assume Ravasco and Fernandes did not find each other at any point, that Diogo Fernandes Pereira had long given up any hope of reconnecting his own squadron, and just went along on his own. Discovery of Socotra A more curious hypothesis is proposed by chronicler Gaspar Correia - namely, that after crossing the Cape by himself, Diogo Fernandes Pereira did not turn into the Mozambique Channel at all, but rather pushed east, sailing under the island of Madagascar, and then sailed north, up the east coast of Madagascar - thus making Diogo Fernandes Pereira the first known captain to sail the 'outer route' to the East Indies. Although Correia's account is not corroborated by other chroniclers, it has an element of plausibility. We do not actually hear of Fernandes stopping at Mozambique Island (where he would have found Ravasco) or any other major African town. Rather, the next we hear of Fernandes is up near Cape Guardafui, which strongly suggests that he did take the outer route as, sailing north by the outer route, would only have seen African coast again precisely around the horn. It was around Cape Gauardafui that, late in the year, Diogo Fernandes Pereira made another breakthrough - discovering the island of Socotra, hitherto unknown to the Portuguese. With the monsoon already reversed, Fernandes anchored in and spent his winter on the island. Socotra was, however, well-enough known to eastern merchants, having been the principal source of Socotra aloe, a highly valued balm in the markets of Arabia and India. More interesting to Fernandes was its strategic location (optimal for a Red Sea patrol) and the existence of an isolated but strong Christian community on the island - Syriac Christians (quasi-Nestorians) to be precise. Fernandes's reports would be excitedly received back in Lisbon, and one squadron of the 8th Portuguese India Armada (Cunha) of 1506 would be given the mission of conquering it for Portugal. Extortion of Zanzibar,