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.

Money spent on good-quality gear is always money well spent.

Running an expedition can bring out the worst in a man. It can make you a power-crazed monster.

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.

Through a strange kind of geographic arrogance, Europeans like to think that the world was a silent, dark, unknown place until they trooped out and discovered it.

Searching for a lost city is a particularly European obsession.

As the head of an expedition, you can't pussyfoot around being polite to everyone. You have to show your teeth once in a while; a little growling goes a long way.

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.

Exploration is a dirty game.