Ewan: Do you have your own theory on what happened to Colonel Fawcett in the Matto Grosso region of Brazil?

Benedict Allen: Hello, Ewan. My personal theory is that he came across an aggressive tribe just east of the Kalapalo - the Kalapalo told me that there is a group called the Iaruna passing through. They were scared of them, and they were scared for Colonel Fawcett who would have met them. But no-one really knows...

Harriet York: Are you always prepared for the possibility that some of the communities you encounter may not be able to adapt to your presence?

Benedict Allen: Harriet, it's always a big worry, and usually I spend weeks, even months, trying to find out about the people I'm hoping to visit. I often send people who are their relatives from a neighbouring tribe to go and talk to them and see if they even want to talk to me. The key is to make it clear that I'm only trying to listen to what they say, so that other people know what they think about the world. Nearly all these isolated groups now feel under threat, and feel that no-one is listening to them.

James Gutten: Have you ever got yourself in to a dangerous situation that seemed so extreme that you thought you might not be able to get your self out of it?

Benedict Allen: Yes, James - about three too many times! Once, when I was in Columbia, the local drug barons thought I must be spying on the Amazon cocaine trade, and they pursued me up a river with a canoe and shot at me. Fortunately for me the drug people were not very good at paddling their canoe and I last saw them using their rifle to paddle with, and going round and round in circles while I managed to jump to the riverbank and escape.

Myles Bradley: How do you keep yourself from becoming lonely during explorations? And do your family miss you when you are away?

Benedict Allen: Myles, it's very hard - the hardest part of my job, being lonely. I like to think my family miss me! The only thing I can do is try and build friends when I'm out in these other places. If you can start to see these apparently hostile environments as a home then you begin to feel that you aren't so isolated or alone. I tend to make friends, even of my camels, and that helps me adapt to other places as well as warding off loneliness.

Kim-Chi: What has been the overall effect on you through your experiences?

Benedict Allen: Kim-Chi, I think it's been one of feeling that we are all the same. Right at the beginning of my travelling life, about twenty years ago, I used to think of these different 'tribal' people as being different from us, and alien to my understanding of the world. But now I feel that they are merely adapted to different surroundings and we are all the same - some of us are generous, some of us are bullies, and meeting all these different people is a wonderful experience because you feel like you're connecting totally different peoples together.

Jo Clayton: Have you ever been scared that, like Blair Witch Project, we, the public, would find your footage years after you'd disappeared?

Benedict Allen: Hello, Jo! On the other hand, it's incredibly reassuring having a camera that I can talk to because I feel that I'm talking to a person after a while, and this person will always be with me and records both the ups and downs of everyday life on the journey. It will act as a reliable witness to whatever happens. I avoid thinking of what might go wrong, because otherwise I wouldn't set off on these journeys to start off with. I just think of the positive and feel that at least I can share these experiences.

Simon Morris: How genuine did the Tuvan shaman feel to you?

Benedict Allen: Simon, personally I have to say I felt sceptical of the Tuvan shamans today. I think there are a lot of inspired people who are doing just as they remember their shamanic grandparents used to do, but they have lost so much under communism that it's very difficult to believe that they are not, in nearly all cases, having to make things up to some extent, if only to fill in parts of ceremonies that have been lost during the persecutions. Shamanism is a tradition which came out of a connection with the natural elements, from people living nomadically, and in many ways, it simply is not a belief system which you can just transfer to life in the city. However, I think in some remote places there are very strong traditions which will maintain into the future important strands of the shamanic tradition. It's a complex subject, but those are my thoughts in a nutshell!