Like porridge in a giant sluice, the story continues…

A bit of clip art later… and voila, hopefully we are done “learning…”

More about The Lost City of the Monkey God can be found here… The real-life escapade looks to be a tad more treacherous that what we are currently seeing…

I almost didn’t recognize Dr. Carter with his hat/helmet removed…

Of course characters have the opportunity to morph in the Trailverse… we may even be looking at a visual representation of how Rusty sees this guy… and his desire to know his birth parents…  Now there’s a story line that could go on for years…

LIDAR… I guess we’ll learn more here by accident than elsewhere by design…

Yes, Dr. Carter, please tell us more!  As George has pointed out, Mara’s overly large head/neck is unnaturally craned forward in anticipation…  Rusty looks like he knows he’s about to get a smack!

And what, I ask, or who, gave Dr. carter the right to go in with heavy equipment and local labor to disturb this piece of cultural antiquity?  This isn’t colonial Egypt, for cripes’ sake…  Bill and Ted?  On an Excellent Adventure??  I’m guessing he gave them all anglo names so that he wouldn’t has to learn or pronounce their actual ones…

The fabulously colored Toucan (you know, pale orange beak, black and white body and gray feet) followed them all the way to the Ruins as Mark continues to explain away the obvious fact that Cherry looks for opportunities to NOT be with her husband… the inveterate Man-splainer…

Sure you do, Mark, and there is no hiding the fact that Cherry will often leave you to your own devices given her natural instincts toward self-preservation!  This time it seems that she wanted Rusty to go as well… even if there is slight collateral damage in the form of this Mara-girl…

the look on Dr. Carter’s face is priceless… Not only is he disappointed that Cherry didn’t make the trip, but now he has to suffer inane questions from children, and finger wagging from Mark…

What is up with Mara the Amazon?  With her prematurely gray mane and adult stature, she’s practically dwarfing Mark, let alone Rusty… Poor Rusty, who just seems to be shrinking away?  And did they really just say what they said in unison?  “Honored?” That’s unlikely.  And weird.

Who introduces a friend that way?  “Famed Archaeologist?”  Who apparently was only really looking forward to seeing Cherry!!  What ever happened in the Trail backstory?  We may never know… Perhaps Cherry is absent on purpose- too painful for both of them…

Why make up names when you can simply reference the past?

Howard Carter was the dude who “discovered” King Tut’s tomb…   Whose appearance was anticipated by the faithful souls reading this page…  But beware, gentlemen… These tombs and temples carry curses!

Oh, Joe…

Always ready for a siesta!!  I guess creepy temples just aren’t your thing, huh??

Careful Mark, don’t touch the merch!!  And careful not to get a whiplash!  As Dr. Carter emerges from the mist? Some random backdrop that makes room only for his pithy comment? We see that he is bedecked in safari gear right out of colonial history… Khakis and a pith helmet!  Now that’s authentic!  And at first glance, it would now seem that he and Mark were childhood friends, if in fact Mark has “known him for 30 years…”

Haven’t we talked about this in the past?  You have to pretend that you are allowed out of the Lost Forest Compound every now and then…  You can’t look all wild-eyed at every last thing you see.  Besides, slipping in a little blase and ennui for Mara’s benefit will only up your cred, young man…

Well, at least we are finally here, you know?  That took a while.  Longer than the ride from the airport to the resort…  Nice mask on the temple!

The fact that we have been on this van-ride now for a week and there seems to be no end in sight…

…along with the fact that Mark has been allowed into the jungle with two young people, especially given his track record of inviting disaster, natural and otherwise…

Why does the van keep changing color?  OK, it’s just vacillating between black and white, but still, it’s puzzling…

And Mark, I am sure that you aren’t the only one excited to see the temple…

…now cue the jurassic era bird…

What? Are there prehistoric renderings of Sponge-Bob?  Now that would be different!

OK, Joe, you are probably starting to over-share a bit… You are now answering questions that no one has asked.

But meanwhile inside the sumptuous ride…

Haven’t you been paying attention, Rusty?  Don’t you realize that you are going to see ruins now?  Or perhaps you can’t equate the phrase “temple in the jungle” with “ruins…”

Now that face in panel three is a new one… Not the usual sleepy, dopey manner we are accustomed to in panel one…

Been losing your hair long, Joe?  Ever have a movie projected on your forehead, Joe?

Nice tree frog!  It’s rare forMark Trail (the strip) to show fauna in the foreground these days.  That was a must back in the Dodd/Elrod era…

If I’m not mistaken, we have yet to meet Professor Carter or learn his first name… but remember, Mark has “known” him for 30 years…”  Since Mark was a tad, apparently…  Which would put the good doctor in his 50’s or 60’s… that is unless they were childhood friends?  Hmmm….

Oh.  My.  Goodness…  How could I have missed this one!?  I mean, this is right in my wheelhouse!  Unless of course I was too… ahem… into the movie when I saw it in high school!!

And for whatever reason, there seems to be a conspiracy among internet providers of the colored version of the strip!  So Trail Noir it is!!

Rusty’s friend Mara… Hmmmm… Now that we know what Mr. Allen is referencing here I think Rusty is quite in over his head!!

Joe would appear to be Anglo… an expat of some kind, running from the law and laying low driving Touristas to Ancient Ruins!!  He seems harmless enough…

The overly polite and formal service staff member (concierge?) is addressing Rusty as “Mister,” not the Spanish equivalent of “Master,” which is probably more appropriate…

Mark’s pissed too, about the head fake, but wants to find cover…

But let’s get real for a moment… this amalgam of ’57 Chevy and Panel Truck isn’t exactly Jungle-worthy either…

Ha!  Yes, indeed, great look-up, Moss!  Recalling a Playmate, no less!

Oh Rusty… Did you really think that limo was for you?  I am not prone to schadenfreude, but seeing the disappointment on Rusty’s face does bring me certain joy…

And what are we left with?  Another strange study in extreme welding…  Sort of like Sid’s toy collection in Toy Story…  or even this beauty, spied in the parking lot of the local Fleet Farm…

Pure Sconi, if every I saw it…

Really?

I wonder who put the property up to this?  The Professor?  Mara’s Father?  Mara, who by the way, continues to grow and dwarf poor Rusty… Look at the shoulders on that lass!   At least this is a serious and needed step up from the taxicab that brought them to the resort.  Rusty is “down” with it though… he’s only ever seen one of these on the TV at home, that is when he’s allowed to watch something other than NatGeo, PBS, or the Nature Channel…

Blah blah blah… Becky (hubba hubba…) Blah blah blah… Took earlier bus… Blah blah blah… dig site…  Blah blah blah… Here’s your ride…

Good heavens… what a waste of ink!  Good thing I take this all in electronically…  Unless of course this is a big set-up and Mark and children are going to be made ransom-bait…

As Mark announces himself and his “expectations,” he informed that the bus has left without him…

Already I don’t like the sound of this…  What “arrangements” have been made, here?  And again, how is it that Mara’s parents instantly trust this Trail guy to keep track of their daughter?  Don’t they know what typically happens whenever Mark heads off into the jungle?  Nothing good, that’s for sure…

I had assumed earlier that, by virtue of his proximity to Assistant Becky, that the male figure at the Dinner Table, not Mark, was in fact the Professor.  But no… seems we met “Mister Corday” instead who apparently is happier to NOT be on a first name basis with Mark…

What is with these goofy faces that keep popping up on these random, non-recurring characters… I honestly don’t know what to think of Mister Corday’s expressions in the first and third panels…  And really? You’re just going to let your daughter ‘tag along’ with a complete stranger?

And where the heck did the Doctor go?

Mark is relying on Becky to tell him the story of the “Lost Temple,”  when she rightly points out that the Professor can explain it better that she can…  But already Mark has his own version of Spidey-Sense going on…  that look in the middle panel gives away his natural skepticism, honed over the years as a writer…