Battle it out

Dmitry Abramishvili is an architect and strike-ball (Airsoft) enthusiast. It seems his life is all about work.

“For the last four years, my schedule has been so tight that I have not had a vacation. But, at least I’ve got the weekends,” he says.

After the routine of a working week is finished, Dmitry gets into his off-roader, packed with quite interesting and slightly suspicious equipment. Several times a month Abramishvili skippers a strike-ball team. Several dozen men and women gather near Moscow to battle it out. Strike ball is a lot like paintball, only there’s no paint. There are realistic looking weapons, heavy machinery and tons of adrenaline.

Dmitry’s team consists mostly of his colleagues and he says such outdoor activity is good for his business:

“It’s convenient for us – we are a team at work and we are a team in the strike-ball field. It is a good way to take the pressure off.”

Treasure hunting with GPS

Sergey Smirnov and his friends prefer a calmer, but nonetheless interesting retreat. They play a game called geocaching. Essentially a form of treasure hunting – someone buries an item and uploads the GPS coordinates to a special website. Then a team of adventure seekers use their skills to find clues which eventually lead them to the hidden box. Sergey says the Moscow region offers a good space for his hobby.

“There are several thousand stashes for geocaching in Russia. More than 10% of them are located in the Moscow region. Geocaching seriously expands our knowledge of the region’s history. We see places we’ve never thought and known of,” he said.

Reach for the sky

For Mikhail Farikh, a retired colonel turned businessman, the Moscow region provides another place for activity – clear skies. Mikhail has fulfilled his childhood dream: he learnt to fly and purchased a helicopter.

Over the years he has mastered the skill and can now do some breathtaking stuff. Mikhail says that helisport can give serious practical advantages.

“You do go to restaurants for a dinner, don’t you? Well, we fly there. Unfortunately, shopping malls have no helipads, so I can’t fly for shopping. But I have used my helicopter to get to distant destinations. I get a better view where to fish or gather mushrooms,” he said.

The downside is that this hobby is best suited to those who don’t worry about their bank balance. Merely learning to fly a helicopter can cost at least $25,000. The machine itself is many times more expensive.

Aleksandr Vinogradov doesn’t have this kind of money, but the love for the skies is there in his heart. That’s why he takes part in balloon flying championships, held several times a year in the Moscow region. He sees little difference between balloons and helicopters, so if it’s almost the same, why pay more?

Slacklining – the new Russian craze

Nikolay Skavinsky’s hobby is slacklining – walking on a rope fixed between two points. This sport originated in the US and is only 30 years old. In Russia it appeared about a year ago.

It is similar to rope walking, but, as Nikolay says, there is a difference. Chiefly, “the dynamics of the robe and webbing.”

“The rope is more static and webbing is just dynamic. Slackline is more about dynamics and it’s harder to balance on it.”

There are two kinds of slacklining: low lining and high lining. The latter can be done on a level of about 15-20 metres above the ground and requires both good physical strength and courage. The world record for high slacklining is about one kilometer above ground.