With no clearer knowledge than could be derived from scant records of Viscayno's voyage in 1602, he selected the two best and most salient points of the California coast, San Diego and Monterey, and ordered the founding of a mission at each. He also ordered the selection of a point midway between these two, for another mission to be called Buena Ventura. His activity, generosity, and enthusiasm were inexhaustible. He seems to have had humor as well; for when discussing the names of the missions to be founded, Father Junipero said to him, "But is there to be no mission for our Father St. Francis?" he replied, "If St. Francis wants a mission, let him show us his post, and we will put one there for him!"
The records of this first expedition into California are full of interest. It was divided into two parts, one to go by sea, and one by land; the sea party in two ships, and the land party in two divisions. Every possible precaution and provision was thought of by the wise Galvez; but neither precaution nor provision could make the journey other than a terrible one. Father Junipero, with his characteristic ardor, insisted on accompanying one of the land parties, although he was suffering severely from an inflamed leg, the result of an injury he had received twenty years before in journeying on foot from Vera Cruz to the city of Mexico. Galvez tried in vain to detain him; he said he would rather die on the road than not go, but that he should not die, for the Lord would carry him through. However, on the second day out, his pain became so great that he could neither sit, stand, nor sleep. Portalá, the military commander of the party, implored him to be carried in a litter; but this he could not brook. Calling one of the muleteers to him, he said,--
"Son, do you not know some remedy for this sore on my leg?"
"Father," replied the muleteer, "what remedy can I know? I have only cured beasts."
"Then consider me a beast," answered Serra; "consider this sore on my leg a sore back, and give me the same treatment you would apply to a beast."
Thus adjured, the muleteer took courage, and saying, "I will do it, Father, to please you," he proceeded to mix herbs in hot tallow, with which he anointed the wound, and so reduced the inflammation that Father Junipero slept all night, rose early, said matins and mass, and resumed his journey in comparative comfort. He bore this painful wound to the end of his life; and it was characteristic of the man as well as of the abnormal standards of the age, that he not only sought no measures for a radical cure of the diseased member, but, obstinately accepting the suffering as a cross, allowed the trouble to be aggravated in every way, by going without shoes or stockings and by taking long journeys on foot.