World Building Help - Finding the Lost Continent

[Tonguez]

The Land Bridge to Australia couldn't be, the oceans never dropped that low.

Yes I meant walk figuratively (ie they entered south asia over a few centuries and then made the relatively short crossing to New Guinea/Australia. The point anyway is that Australia was inhabited 25000-odd years ago and then become pretty much isolatd from the rest of the world (although some legends do sugget Asian traders would visit the northern coasts)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Reasons a continent becomes considered "lost":

1) It hasn't been discovered yet- simply too far away.
2) The 1 empire that knew about it fell
3) The 1 empire that knows about it isn't telling
4) A powerful curse/act of the gods
5) The people who inhabit it got there because of a shipwreck (best analog in fiction-David Brin's last few books in the Uplift series)
6) Natural phenomenon discourage its discovery- currents, dead calm weather zones, hyperactive weather zones (like Cape of Good Hope), unique features (Sargasso Sea)
7) Natural disaster destroys landbridge/peninsula that connects two land-masses (meteor, volcano)