Journeys seem to start from the very childhood.
Well, actually, a tiny baby is lying in its crib, wiggling its toes and fingers, moving its eyes, traveling around its warm shelter. It is like the first journey, isn't it? Then we move down the crib, migrate with our relatives. Now on all fours around mummy, further and further from our home, trespassing our world's limits.
And some cannot stop until they reach cosmic spaces. Some are satisfied with their house radius: home-school-office - dacha.
Аnd why is it so, I can't tell. Maybe, everybody does his work and has his own radius within which he/she travels.

And this is a good thing.

Aleksander Ivanov

The head of "Assol" tourist club, Tatyana Yurievna Serykh was also "infected" by dromomania during her study at geo-biological faculty of the Ural State Pedagogical University via an enthusiastic sport tourism Companion – Raissa Borisovna Rubel.

Tatyana Yurievna Serykh

All her life Tatyana Yurievna worked as Geography teacher at a secondary school № 66 in Uralmash district. Like many others, all her life was marked with the routes across the vast territories of the former Soviet Union. It is her Geobiography that has prompted the idea of "Geo-gram" – its image was unexpectedly born after connecting her routes points on the map.

Not only Svetlana Kaigorodova but also hundreds of young boys and girls struggled on through the pathless land opening the World. One of these girls happened to meet her at our exhibition and decided to come and see her Teacher after all these years.

From Zurbagan we'll head at Kent
We'll never lose our way.
And Grin's legend of Frazy Grant
Will brighten our way.

Have you had such a Teacher?



Unlike Svetlana and Tatyana, nobody inspired and instructed Kirill. There was something about him that sprung on the surface under certain circumstances.

At the age of 6 I was taken to hospital for several months. Not to get bored my parents brought me a globe. I was lying in bed thinking why islands were made so small, there might be a lot of interesting there. My curiosity resulted in a table-size map of Ceylon. Its transport, climate, travel history, physical geography found their place on it. I felt that I was the greatest explorer

Then I draw other islands and continents, entered Moscow State University, the department of Geography, worked for Africa section at the radio, defended my thesis in Geography, then another one to obtain a doctorate degree and many other things…….

But the main dream which seemed to be never realized was to walk by the roads I myself had paved. And it did come true.

I have traveled across 59 countries of the world and some islands which beckoned me in my childhood.

A long travel starts with a big dream.

History is full of such enthusiastic travelers. Unfortunately, we know a little about what circumstances triggered dreams or passion which guide all human life. Among such stories is a legendary life of serf mechanic Artamonov who invented an iron bicycle in 1800, rode it and in 1801 made an unprecedented ride from Verkhoturie to Moscow (about 2000 versts). Due to the legend it was first in the world bicycle ride. The ride was initiated by Artamonov owner who intended to overwhelm the tsar Aleksander I with such a "rara avis". Thanks to this invention Artamonov and his offspring was granted manumission.

The bicycle is kept in the funds of Local History Museum in Nizhny Tagil. The Sverdlovsk Regional Museum of Local History has a XIX century model of this thing on display.

In spite of the fact that historical texts neither confirm nor deny this legend the Sverdlovsk studio shot a film «Оh, a bicycle!» in 1976, and a monument to a cycle travel pioneer was erected in Vainera Street in Yekaterinburg.

A lot more is known about another Russian cyclist –traveler, Onisim Pankratov, who finalized his world ride 10 August, 1913 in Harbin. The idea of this tour round the world was prompted by his father, Pyotr Pankratov and a newspaper article reporting about the International Cycling federation prize – a diamond palm tree - established in 1896 for the first athlete who would make a cycling tour round Europe.

In 1990s another newspaper article inspired one more cyclist, our compatriot, resident of Pyshma settlement (Sverdlovskaya oblast) Yury Chalmalyov, to ride all over the world.

The idea came to his head in 1965 when a boy of 10 read about an Indian peace messenger, who had been sent by Indira Gandy to propagate peace around the world. Yury's hour arrived in hard times of the 1990s as soon as the "Iron Curtain" fell.

In the photo Yury's bike displayed within the framework of "The art of Travel" exhibition in Pyshma (November, 2014)

It must be great when a person has succeeded in finding his life way. But those without a particular dream or passion but still having put their Geobiography on autopilot must be even luckier. It does not depend on the epoch, or social background, or status.

The ultimate dream of Nikolay Komarov, a Soviet engineer, was of cruiser voyage spent in a cabin with conditioning, a tour to a corporate sanatorium, preferably at the seaside. Like Nice for the XIXs, Antalya and Hurghada in the XXIs, Kislovodsk and Gagry were not just resorts but recreational symbols and standards.

Klavdiya Uglyova dreamt of crossing the country, seeing it in its uniqueness and diversity, discovering the Great Russian Rivers, the North, mountains, old fortresses, and cities. She hectically turned the leaves of the USSR routing directory looking for her much sought- after itinerary.

Having crossed the country from the South to the East, possessing fervor to pave new routes and open new tracks Klavdiya Mikhailovna was elected Head of Weekend Tours Club in the City of Yekaterinburg Tourist Club. In the period of 1973 to 2013 she organized more than 4000 hikes of 40 000 kilometers long.


We cannot choose the epoch to live in. We can choose roads.