The Lost City of Stone

There have been countless books and theories about the possible existence of the continent Atlantis, but hardly any consideration has been given to the very real, though mysterious, lost "Atlantis" of the Pacific - Nan Madol: a monolithic stone corpse of a city lying just off the island of Panape, largest island of the Pacific Carolines, and covering about eleven square miles. No one knows who built it - or, for that matter, why or how. It remains to this day a monument to a great lost civilization, its origins clouded in myth and legend (one being that it was inhabited by Demons and gods of nature). "Visiting the city is a shocking experience to a traveler," writes Bill Ballinger, who traveled to Nan Madol in 1976. "It is hidden from the air and is not visible from land or sea. Nan Madol lies beneath a thick canopy of towering trees and is entirely camoflaged by a thick, interlocking, repacious undergrowth of jungle brush, bushes, weeds, vines, and moss. The great walls [walls which were made from basalt-crystal 'logs,' and laid crosswise in a fashion similar to American log-cabin construction] have been wrecked by the thrusting roots of giant trees, and the cannibalistic appetite of the jungle gnaws away at the skeleton remains without stopping. As a boat [the only feasible way one can reach the place] approaches the site, the mangrove trees crowd the shoreline in an impenetrable screen. The only indication of the ruins is the remains of a sea wall, which now barely protudes above the water in disconnected sections. Abruptly, as the boat heads in toward the shore, small islets appear at irregular intervals. These are the former canals of the great city, laid out in a semicheckerboard, elongated plan. The canals are shallow, filled with silt and sand, their banks covered with jungle overgrowth...An eerie silence, broken only by the screams and calls of jungle birds, prevails under the towering green umbrella suddenly engulfing the entire world.