A father has ridden a motorbike through 29 provinces to find his son who was believed to be stolen 12 years ago.

He managed to reunite seven trafficked children with their families on his journey, but could not find his own boy, Legal Evening News reported.

Guo Gangtang, 40, a native of Liaocheng City in eastern China's Shandong Province, now lives in an 8-square-meter basement in suburban Beijing and operates a gourd store to raise money to continue his odyssey which has already cost him 300,000 yuan (US$44,000), the newspaper said.

Guo was out working when his two-year-old son disappeared on September 21, 1997. On the evening he returned, his neighbors said his son was taken away by a 20-something woman whom they believed to be a child trafficker, Guo told the newspaper.

Almost 500 villagers volunteered to help him look for his child but couldn't find any clues. Neither could the police.

Desperate, Guo decided to rely on himself and set out on his first journey in 1998.

Each time he set out on his motorcycle he carried two bags of handcrafted gourds he sold to finance his mission. The gourds carried information about his son.

In the past decade, he has traveled all across China except for Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Tibet Autonomous Region, Qinghai and Taiwan, and gone through eight motorcycles.

He infiltrated the human trafficking gangs and sometimes was attacked by gang members when he was exposed.

"Once I didn't have anything to eat for two days and had to beg for food at a restaurant," he said.

After he failed to find his son, Guo had a second son in October 2000. But the baby only reminded him more of his missing son and spurred him to pick up the hunt again, he said.

While continuing his hunting journeys, Guo became a volunteer for an online community formed by parents whose children had been trafficked.

From the experience he gained on the journeys, he suggested local governments improve residence management of young children to help crack down on baby traffickers.

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