This trade, which drove the world economy from the end of the Middle Ages well into the Renaissance, ushered in an age of European domination in the East. Channels such as the Bay of Bengal served as bridges for cultural and commercial exchanges between diverse cultures as nations struggled to gain control of the trade along the many spice routes. In 1571 the Spanish opened the first trans-Pacific route between its territories of Philippines and Mexico, served by the Manila Galleon, which lasted until 1815. The Portuguese trade routes were mainly restricted and limited by the use of ancient routes, ports, and nations that were difficult to dominate. The Dutch were later able to bypass many of these problems by pioneering a direct ocean route from the Cape of Good Hope to the Sunda Strait in Indonesia.