Shanxi volcano park lures tourists

A distance view of one of the dead volcanoes at Datong Volcano Geographic Park in Datong county, Shanxi's Datong city. [Photo by Chen Zhilin/chinadaily.com.cn]

A volcanic rock at the main gate of Datong Volcano Geographic Park in Datong county, North China's Shanxi province. [Photo by Chen Zhilin/chinadaily.com.cn]

Datong Volcano Geographic Park is located in the border area of Datong and Yanggao counties in Shanxi province. The park covers 129.8 square kilometers and is home to 32 dead volcanoes whose average height is 1,100 meters above sea level.

The volcanoes began erupting 700,000 years ago and stopped about 100,000 years ago. They survived hundreds of thousands years of wind erosion.

As the only volcano cluster on the Loess Plateau in China, the park also enables tourists to visit the Sanggan River basalt valley landform and the lava-dammed lake. It has become a treasure of the volcanic landform in Northeast Asia.

In 1953, Peking University selected Datong Volcano Geographic Park as its landform study base. Many other universities later included the park in their field trials. The park is also a national science education base for young students and a new tourist sight for visitors from home and abroad.