A veteran teacher in China's westernmost Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region has trekked some 300,000 km -- equal to a distance of seven round-the-globe trips -- in 30 years to collect fossils.

Xiang Zhongyuan, 60, is a retired nature science teacher in Qitai county of the Muslim Hui Autonomous Prefecture of Changji, in northeastern Xinjiang. Of all the proven 300 types of animal and plant fossils dotted along a "fossil corridor" on the east of Junggar Basin, Xiang picked more than 200, and 180 of them passed experts' authentication.

Among his most valuable collections are algae fossils from 800 million years ago, Jurassic dinosaur fossils from 100 million years ago and the first sponge fossil ever spotted in Xinjiang.

The avid collector dates back his zest for fossils to the 1960s when teaching at an elementary school in Qitai county. "I happened to find a lovely, exotic stone in the village one day and took it home. I later found out in a science textbook it was an invaluable bird fossil."

His keen interest was fired after his transfer in the 1970s to another school in Beitashan area along the Sino-Mongolian border that was teeming with fossils. "From then on, I spent all my spare time hunting for fossils on the east of Junggar Basin and down south to the mountains in Xinjiang."

Driven by a lust for more fossils, Xiang has adventured to the secluded Tarim Basin, the Kunlun Mountains and the Lop Nur desert. He used to travel on foot until motor vehicles became available in the 1990s.

"Some trips were real risks: once I had to crouch in a ditch for two days to shield myself from gales," he recalled.

In another fossil hunting trip, Xiang got strapped in the mountain for nearly two weeks. He had nothing to live on three straight days when a herder came to his aid.

Experts cite Xiang's findings as crucial and very helpful to their researches on the evolution of ancient wildlife and physical geography. He has contributed a great deal to a recent publication on the evolution of wild animals in Xinjiang, according to publishers of the book.

Today, fossil collectors around China will contact and keep in touch with Xiang before setting out for their adventures in Xinjiang. And Xiang has been often taken as their "road map" inside the vast region. He often escorted them on their fossil hunting tours, but as a matter of fact, he getting on in years, his interest is to open a fossil museum so as to acquaint more people with ancient living species on earth.

(Xinhua News Agency December 10, 2004)