Only a man who has his health, a full stomach and wears clean clothes would ever entertain the notion of tracking down the greatest lost city on Earth.

There are two ways to find a lost city. The first is to rely on luck alone, the second is to control all the information.

Searching for a lost city is a particularly European obsession.

The quest for a lost city erodes your body, damaging you beyond all reason. But it is your mind that bears the heaviest toll. Listen to the doubters, the worriers and the weak, and the vaguest hope of success evaporates.

In some warped way, having an embalmed body with us made perfect sense.

Explorers like to pretend that they are a select breed of people with iron nerve and an ability to endure terrible hardship.