The Story of Explorer Liu Yutian

International Online Report: Since becoming the first person in China to walk the length of the Great Wall in May 1984, Liu Yutian’s feet have never stopped. He traveled through the Taklimakan Desert, the world's second largest desert located in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, four times, once through the Gurbantunggut Desert, and inspected the Lop Nur no-man's land in Xinjiang, known as the "Valley of Death"; He also entered Tibet ten times, walked through the no-man’s land in northern Tibet, was the first to complete the entire Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon, and attempted to climb Mount Everest...

Liu Yutian was responsible for these difficult adventures. Completed by people. He not only challenged the limits of life many times, but also created countless "firsts" in Chinese adventures. Over the years, Liu Yutian has been walking non-stop in wilderness, desert, snow-capped mountains and jungles. Recently, Liu Yutian accepted an interview with our reporter Li Guangming. He talked about his adventures, pursuits and life insights.

Liu Yutian is 63 years old, with gray hair hanging long on his shoulders. Although the face is covered with wrinkles of vicissitudes of life, the skin is dark and shiny. He told reporters:

"Initially (the hike) was due to competition and strong emotions. Americans and French wanted to walk the Great Wall. Our ancestors built the Great Wall and let foreigners walk. We felt that it was embarrassing. This was for the sake of shame. Let’s win glory for the country. After a lot of fighting, I lost my job, so in the end, exploration became my job. It also changed my whole life.”

< p>21 years ago, 42-year-old Liu Yutian walked the length of the Great Wall with the slogan "Revitalizing China, Start with Me." At that time, his actions caused quite a stir in China and he became an idol worshiped by many people. After that, he got out of control and determined to go there alone before foreigners crossed the Taklimakan Desert. So, regardless of the hot weather and immature conditions, he set off. During more than 20 days of hiking in the desert, he experienced dangers such as losing his way, running out of food and water, and fainting from hunger. He ate flies, mosquitoes, and lizards in the desert... After going through all kinds of hardships, when he was finally rescued by a shepherd, he only weighed 45 kilograms of his original weight of 74 kilograms.

Although his first trek across the Taklimakan Desert failed, he did not give up. That winter, with the support of enthusiastic people, Liu Yutian finally crossed the Taklimakan Desert with six camels, becoming the first explorer in the world to cross the "Sea of ??Death" alone on foot.

After that, he crossed the Gurbantunggut Desert alone. During this time travel, he almost lost his life. In the desert, he fell ill. His whole body was swollen, his fever persisted, his feet were ulcerated, and his boots were frozen and he couldn't take them off.

He struggled to find a hospital on the edge of the desert. The doctor diagnosed him with "sepsis" and suggested amputating his legs. Liu Yutian didn't agree with anything. Having studied traditional Chinese medicine, he believed that diseases contracted in the desert can only be cured in the desert. He prepared enough food and water, called two Uyghur villagers, and asked them to make a stretcher out of red willow branches and carry him to the wilderness desert.

The temperature at that time was already minus 40 degrees Celsius. The doctor said that doing so would be equivalent to death, but Liu Yutian insisted on going. As a result, he miraculously cured his illness using his unique medical methods and necessary medicines. The doctor looked at Liu Yutian who had returned with scars on his legs and kept saying: How is this possible?

Liu Yutian's behavior is difficult for ordinary people to understand. Some people say that he is a "fool" and "crazy". His wife also divorced him because she couldn't stand his "weird" problems such as sleeping with the window open at minus 30 degrees Celsius.

But Liu Yutian still goes his own way. When traveling through Lop Nur, he had no money to buy camels, so he bought seven small donkeys to carry things, and took his 18-year-old son with him. As a result, the donkeys ran away and his son was almost lost.

"At that time, I said, son, my body is all injured, and I am too tired, you go and get the donkey back. As a result, there are still yellow sheep in the desert, (my son has no desert experience,) I couldn't see the tracks of the hooves of the goats and donkeys in the desert, and I got lost in the desert from the time I set out in the morning until dark at night. Fortunately, my son didn't go too far, and he saw the bonfire I lit on the way back at night. , found me. Of course, this is also in line with my philosophy. If you can crawl out of the desert, others will say you are a hero, but if you can't crawl out, you will be a bear."

This is the case with Liu Yutian. A strange man, a weirdo. He said the adventure brought him back to nature.

“Twenty years of travel has made me far away from the city, and the things I care about are getting further and further away. I don’t care about what you care about, I don’t know what you know, and what you think is different from what I think. There is a gap. I feel like I am at home in nature."

Liu Yutian has completely integrated his life into nature. To this day, he still remembers his spiritual feelings when climbing Mount Everest:

“After reaching more than 6,000 meters, I suddenly saw that the snow was so white and clean. I stepped up with my big-toe boots and there was a clack. My heart skipped a beat, as if I had stepped on it. The snow was so clean and unconcerned with the world, but I had brought trouble to it. I didn’t dare to leave, as if the place ahead was where gods (immortals) stayed. Same."

It was his special feelings for Tibet that led Liu Yutian to cross the Brahmaputra Grand Canyon for the first time in 1993. Over the past few years, he has been hiking in Tibet and climbed the Geladandong Snow Peak at the source of the Yangtze River, the father's sacred mountain in the hearts of Tibetans. Later, he walked through the no-man's land in northern Tibet, and also went to remote and dangerous mountainous areas such as Ganoderma lucidum, Medog, and Zhangmu in Tibet.

Someone once asked Liu Yutian what was the point of continuing like this. He said he collected information as he went. At the same time, he was also taking time to organize information and write his adventure notes. He said that he was a pioneer and he wanted to use his life to leave something for future explorers, but he felt that his knowledge was limited and he was a little regretful. He said:

"I think Chinese exploration is still in its initial stage. Just like me, I have never even gone to college, while foreign explorers are scholars, experts, professors, archaeologists, and geographers. Architects and geologists are all people who are accomplished in certain fields, and we are sorry for this. If exploration is a kind of engineering, then what is more important now is the accumulation of knowledge. I am so old and have been doing it now. Make up lessons."

Liu Yutian loves his adventure career and has already put into action and plans to try more than 80 adventure projects. He told reporters that he would soon go to the Hoh Xil no-man's land at the intersection of Tibet, Qinghai and Xinjiang to see what the current situation of the Tibetan antelopes living there is like.

"Just like being a parent, these more than 80 adventure projects are my children, and every one of them is unforgettable for me. Of course, the most unforgettable one is going to Tibet."