Off-road trekker crowns himself king of the desert

A former businessman, initially motivated by his desire to explore the unknown in the wild, has driven across the dunes of Taklimakan Desert in Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region again and again, most of the time on his own.

Navigating the sandy landscapes, he was obsessed with placing himself in the wide, open spaces to enjoy the unrestrained tranquility offered by the desert and gradually formed a passion for promoting the country's domestic automotive industry and its natural wonders.

Last month, Dong Changkai, 60, teamed up with other four off-road vehicle drivers and drove across the Taklimakan Desert, the world's second largest drifting desert, to create a route in the shape of a map of China, which looks like a rooster, expressing their love for the country and its spectacular landscape.

Their route passed through Yuli county and Qiemo county in Bayingolin Mongolian autonomous prefecture, Minfeng county and Yutian county in Hotan prefecture and Shaya county in Aksu prefecture.

The journey was sponsored by a travel agency in Yuli county.

Ma Xingjian, head of the agency, says the cross-desert journey is expected to help promote beauty of the area, including poplar forests and sand dunes, so as to spark tourism in the county.

The track Dong and his teammates followed throughout the 18-day journey covered more than 43,758 square kilometers, which has been recognized by Carrying the Flag World Records, an institution in London that specializes in acknowledging world records, as the largest navigation track "China Land Map" in the world.

It was not the first time for Dong to lay claim to a world record.

Since October he has driven a domestically produced off-road vehicle across the Taklimakan Desert alone three times along different routes, each time managing to lay claim to a world record.

"When I drove into the depth of the desert, I was the only human in the area, staying far away from what is artificial. Such a boundless openness that I wouldn't find anywhere else enabled me to be peaceful and sort things out."

His eagerness to embark on outdoor adventures germinated in his high school years, he says. He often followed his father, a geological explorer who prospected mines in Kashgar prefecture, to travel around the prefecture during summer holidays, and the picturesque scenery and diverse terrain he came across fired his desire to explore wilder places.

He put driving across Taklimakan Desert on his to-do list at that time.

In 2012 he planned to cease doing business and start prepare for a solo cross-desert journey.

"The expansive landscape, the rugged, complicated terrain, the soft sands and the harsh environment there together make it extremely hard to drive across the Taklimakan Desert," he says.

He began to hone his off-road driving skills and equip himself with the knowledge to ensure safety when dealing with challenging conditions, such as sandstorms or vehicle breakdown.

For adaptability training, he drove into the Kumtag Desert in Shanshan county of Xinjiang, the sixth-largest desert in China, dozens of times a year.

In the beginning he set out at 5 am every day to drive an empty vehicle into the Kumtag Desert, with an expanse of 1,700 hectares, to finish a 200-kilometer off-road return journey in a day.

Later he began to carry a load of more than 600 kilograms on the vehicle and then simulate different emergencies that could face him in a desert-crossing.

Gradually the navigation tracks he had drawn in the desert formed dense grids, and he became a seasoned desert adventurer.

Dong insisted that he drove Chinese-made vehicles every time he traveled across the Taklimakan. He says he hopes more people get to know that these Chinese-made vehicles are capable of delivering excellent performance in rugged off-road environments.

He is working to support the local government and off-road driving clubs in Xinjiang to hold a folk sport event that encourages professional off-road drivers to operate domestically made vehicles to race in the Taklimakan Desert.

"I think people may be interested in the event if what the racers drive is exactly the same as their own family vehicles."

He also plans to share his knowledge about Chinese-made off-road vehicles and personal experience on cross-desert journeys on short-video-streaming platforms, he says.