Adventure tours have become an innovation in the field of tourism, which has been developed in recent decades. They have nothing to do with those adventurous wanderings of the past, which were inevitably accompanied by hunger, scurvy, and even the threat of loss of life. Adventure tours are considered to be commercial travel with active modes of transportation associated with being in a natural environment.

It is generally accepted that adventure tours are fundamentally different from outdoor activities, sports and extreme tourism. In our opinion, in real life it is often very difficult to draw a clear line. The main difference between sports tourism and adventure tourism is that sports tourism is aimed at meeting certain standards, it is alien to excessive comfort and service. At the same time, adventure tourism is still a pleasure vacation with a specific cognitive purpose. Comfort and quality service are exactly what tourists pay money for. They need comfort even in a car trip. Such comfort implies high-quality varied food, excursion and entertainment programs, and most importantly, increased attention to their safety.

Active recreation in nature involves a struggle with the harsh elements that must be overcome, conquered and curbed. Another thing is a snowmobile safari, the purpose of which is to study the life of whales or penguins in the icy silence of the Antarctic or to study the exclusively original epic "Hairstring" in Mountain Shoria. Or trekking along the abandoned Circum-Baikal Railway, laid at the beginning of the 20th century. in sheer cliffs and still amazing by the perfection of the technical thought of its creators.

Preparation for real adventures begins at the moment when a person has a desire to know the nature, history, culture of any region, best of all inaccessible and maybe even little known (given that no transport has been going to many Russian villages for a long time, for such discoveries even You don't always have to travel far.

The set of means and methods of transportation in an adventure tour can be very different: raft, canoe, jeep, camel, elephant, horse, donkey, bicycle, and so on, ending with your own legs. The choice of means of transportation is determined by the purpose of the trip. Very often in During adventure tours, various discoveries are made that are of great importance for science and culture. This is especially true for Russia. The vast expanses of our country are still largely unexplored. The scale of the country and the number of research specialists are not comparable. Therefore, almost any participant in the adventure tour can discover something completely new (well, at least for themselves).

Adventure tours without extreme sports, according to one apt expression - that "potatoes without salt." Therefore, it is not necessary to separate adventure and extreme types of tourism so categorically. Adventure tours are aimed at a significant layer of Russian and foreign tourists who want to become travel heroes for a while, take part in a real expedition full of adventures through the most interesting and hard-to-reach places in Russia.

In this regard, one of the interesting areas of adventure tourism is the inclusion of tourists in geological, archaeological, paleontological, ethnographic, biological, geophysical expeditions conducted by scientists. Such expeditions can be either stationary (for example, at an excavation site) or exploratory, aimed at discovering new objects of study. Adventure photo safari tours are very popular all over the world, many of which, according to the conditions, are very close to extreme sports.

One of the varieties of adventure tourism is ecological extreme travel associated with the study and protection of the flora and fauna of our planet. The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWR), one of the most popular non-governmental environmental organizations in the world, plays a special role in the development of this area all over the world. In Russia, there is an active branch of WWR, in the scope of which some travel companies are also involved. A small travel company "Aspera" organizes small (up to 14 people) groups of tourists going to the most exotic corners of the planet by car, motorcycle, on horseback, or even just on foot. Tours are divided into six categories according to the level of difficulty. Part of the money from each tour is donated to the WWR Russia Wildlife program.

An integral part of the adventure sphere is historical adventure tourism. We have already given examples of living in reconstructed conditions of different times and peoples, which have been created in many research and cultural centers. In some cases, even staying at an interesting natural, archaeological or historical monument is an extreme in itself.

For example, the life of the already mentioned historical and archaeological center Arkaim in the Chelyabinsk region is quite extreme. On the left bank of the river, next to the ancient "city", there are several small wooden houses where the staff of the reserve live. There is also an old building of the Museum "Nature and Man" and a hangar - either a cinema hall or a lecture hall. On the right bank there is a huge platform on which there are several trailers where you can live. There is also a dining room, which is a few canopies with tables. The kitchen is a wooden house that looks like a barn. The “architectural” complex of household buildings is completed by a bookstore, also known as a souvenir shop. The rest of the territory is free. For a nominal fee, you can pitch your tents here. The only amenities are a toilet and a washbasin. You can cook your own food - firewood is sold. That's the whole life. Living conditions, especially in the heat, are approaching extreme. But many visitors prefer the Arkaim starry sky to trailers.

Developing the ideas of theatricalization in tourism in conjunction with extreme sports (i.e. immersion of participants in the atmosphere, life, living conditions of a particular era in the history of Russia or any other country), you can come up with a lot of projects (fortunately, the history of our country is extremely rich in various, including very extreme events).

Another direction in historical adventure tourism is the organization of the participation of tourists in the work of the Poisk squads, which conduct surveys at the battlefields of the Great Patriotic War. At present, this is mainly done by enthusiasts, and in most cases they carry out such important and necessary work at their own expense. However, this type of activity is undoubtedly associated with extreme sports, therefore, with skillful advertising and organization, it may well become an inexhaustible tourist resource for people who seek risk. Attraction of additional financial and human resources will thus solve several problems at once: search and reburial of soldiers who died during the Great Patriotic War, restoration of white spots in its history, search and preservation of military rarities, patriotic education, active useful pastime, etc.

Adventure tourism has very great prospects for development in natural and cultural centers, in which various monuments of nature, history and culture are concentrated. One of the most widely known in Russia in recent years are the reserve in Teberda and Sinegorye. The Teberdinsky Reserve, located in Kabardino-Cherkessia, which has excellent resources, combines a variety of types of tourism activities: cultural and historical, ecological, extreme, educational types of tourism.

For tourists, the widest program has been prepared to get acquainted with the nature, history and culture of the reserve, horseback riding tours are organized for a variety of categories of people (for example, the Golden Mustang tour is a seven-day tour with hotel accommodation, combined with horseback riding reserved places, but the horse riding tour in the Duu gorge takes ten days, during which tourists swim in lakes, visit narzan springs, and enjoy fishing).

The largest astronomical laboratory is located in the Teberdinsky Reserve. Tours “Vacations in the Astronomical Laboratory” are constantly organized for schoolchildren, during which, in addition to getting to know the reserve, the guys are engaged in night observations of the starry sky with the help of the world's largest telescopes.

The country of the Blue Mountains - "Sinegorye" is located in the Sotkinsky district of the Chelyabinsk region, on the most elevated and mountainous part of the Southern Urals. Holidays in the Blue Mountains can bring many surprises - riding a dog sled of the Ural Father Frost, traveling on lake ice to mountain ranges, climbing peaks. Not far from the recreation center at the site of archaeological excavations of the VIII-III millennium BC. e. the construction of the village of craftsmen began. Tourists amateurs can live in the dwellings of the Neolithic era, test themselves in the activities and lifestyle of primitive people. On the territory of the Blue Mountains there is a historical and natural park Porogy - a monument included in the lists of especially valuable and protected monuments of history and culture of UNESCO.

If desired, tourists can take part in rafting on the Ural rivers Satka, Lunnaya, Ai. While rafting down the Ai River, you can admire a unique natural monument - the Ai prites - hundred-meter sheer cliffs that break right into the river. Caving trips are organized for lovers of underground tourism. A well-known object to visit is the Sikiyaz-Taman cave complex, opened in 1995 on the Ai River. It is a kind of cave city, consisting of 42 underground cavities. Unique archaeological discoveries have been made in 14 caves, which represent seven historical eras - from the Paleolithic to the Middle Ages.

Adventure tourism in Russia is still a very little developed field of activity. However, its popularity is so high that it is beginning to develop in many small towns. Veliky Ustyug stands out in this regard.