Igor Idimeshev, 48: 'We are building the Yeti Park now, and of course there will be a chance for people who come here to see creature. For me having Yetis here means something much more than the tourist attraction'.

The new Yeti Park will be constructed at Sheregesh ski resort, in the stunning Shoria Mountain area of Kemerovo region in southern Siberia. The development comes with a pledge by the region's governor Aman Tuleyev to offer a one million rouble ($33,000) reward to anyone who can catch a Yeti and prove its existence.

'I'll pay a million to anyone who will find the Yeti and bring it to see the me. I'll sit down with him, chat and have a cup of tea', he promised.

Critics see the Yeti Park - with a hotel and a themed children's playground - as a crude attempt to bring in both Russian and foreign tourists.

'We can see how Scotland exploits the Loch Ness Monster, who why can't we do the same with the Yeti?' admitted one official. 'We hope people will come from all over the world.'

Recent tours to remote caves in the region have found samples of Yeti hair, though various promises of definitive DNA research on them have somehow failed to materialise.

Despite this, local officials insist the Yeti is real, even if Igor Idimeshev, 48, deputy head of the local administration in Sheregesh, and the man behind the new park, has a novel explanation for its existence.

'I've seen this creature several times', he said. 'I think it is most likely of the extraterrestrial origin, not from this world. The Yeti might suddenly disappear and re-materialise. Another extraordinary thing is that Yeti's hair is luminous at night, and also that the Yeti can walk on water.'

Later in an interview with The Siberian Times, he elaborated on his close encounters with the Yeti, despite admitting his mother told him not to tell people because they would not believe him.

'I've met these creatures several times here in Tashtagol district and also in the area where I was born in the village of Toz close to Zelenaya Mountain.

Mountain Mustag, Sheregesh, Shoria. Picture: Igor Idimeshev

'I saw it several times before I moved here to Sheregesh. Each time I was on my own, I was hunting. The only person I ever told everything in detail to was my mother - and she taught me to keep it to myself.

'People will simply think you've made it up', she told me.

'We people of Shoria do not use the name 'Yeti', instead we call these creatures Big Men. Every man round here sees him when he hunts. It's all right to mention the fact of meeting - but we don't go into the details of it, like where exactly it was, what he did do, or your luck will be gone forever.

'The feeling is one of fear. It is a fear that you cannot explain rationally. You feel yourself very scared and tense at the same time. One of the closest comparisons is the feeling of looking into a wolf's eyes. If you've ever seen them - I mean a wild wolf, not a caged animal - you remember a feeling of them being something very unusual, alien.

'Like with a wolf, you can see a Yeti's eyes from a distance of some 100-150 metres. They are quite hypnotising. And when I saw the Yeti's eyes my only thought was that they are not from Earth - they are clearly of an extraterrestrial nature.

'To me, the Yeti is an extraterrestrial creature. I believe that it is like a controller to look over things here on Earth.

I can understand why people do not notice creations like this. We were designed and created to live in a very smart way to protect our minds from information that can damage them. Put it simply - we ignore things that we can't explain, which is very wise, people otherwise would go insane.

On more mundane aspects of the Yeti, he said: 'I would not be able to give an estimate of the Yeti's size.

'It certainly looked big. Bigger than a human. I didn't go to have a look at his footprints, or check for any other material proof of his existence. Believe me, this is not what you want to do right after seeing it. You feel scared.

'We are building the Yeti Park now, and of course there will be a chance for people who come here to see creature. For me having Yetis here means something much more than the simple tourist attraction'.

He stressed: 'We will have a dedicated plot of land for Yeti park, where anyone can see it. We will organise a museum, exhibiting all Yeti-related objects, like the trees they make into arches, and many other things. This location will be used for all future conferences and seminars devoted to the Yeti'.

The Yeti theme is 'important for the region', he said.

Top to bottom: man picks up what later is presented as a 'Yeti's hair'; members of Yeti expedition enter Azasskaya Cave, Siberia; close up and measure of the so-called Yeti's hair. Pictures: Vesti TV Russia, The Siberian Times

Last year Professor Valentin Sapunov claimed a population of 200 Yeti exist in the Kemerovo, Khakassia and Altai regions of Siberia. Sapunov is a doctor of Biological Sciences and Chief Fellow of Russian State HydroMeteorological University.

But his claims on tests of hair found in a cave in this region, which suggested they belonged to an unknown mammal, were strongly disputed by Professor Oleg Pugachev, Director of the Zoological Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences.

In September last year, three separate sightings of Yeti were reported in southern Siberia.