"And all the time we spent in this place would fade and vanish, like a dawn dream on waking that colors the day but cannot be touched or remembered.
Marco Polo gets lost in the desert. Today I learned that there is a part of a desert in Turkey called Taklamakan, which is Turkik for "If you go in, you won't come out again." Coincidentally the "soft places" described in this chapter all have stories associated with them about people disappearing while there. The Australian Outback near Uluru (that place has power), Islands in the Pacific (where Amelia Earhart's plane supposedly vanished), Deserts, a hill in Ireland (gateway to the realm of Faerie). The only one I have not figured out is why there aren't any legends about a disappearing mountain in Arizona, unless it has something to do with a little known Native American legend.