It may seem that all the islands have been explored a long time ago, and the era of great discoveries is a thing of the past along with great travelers. Figurines! Our contemporaries are not bastard, there are some among them that any Columbus or Cortes will be gagged in the belt. Here you are both scientists-practitioners, who added a zest of madness to the route, and adventurers who decided to take a trip around the world alone or even in a company.
Films are made about their follies, their photos are printed on the pages of magazines and newspapers, and it is thanks to the merits of these people that we can today see a world full of dangers, passions, bright colors and adventure stories in all its splendor.
Jacques-Yves Cousteau
In terms of fame, it is difficult to compare with the great French naturalist, oceanographer and explorer of the flora and fauna of the ocean depths, Captain Cousteau. This venerable gentleman showed the whole world the previously unattainable beauty of the sea depths and became god of all modern divers, having designed a device suitable for this kind of diving.
Exploring the depths, Cousteau constructed the legendary Callisto nautical laboratory and the first submersible Denise bathyscaphe, leading and dispatching an army of millions, demonstrating the beauty and wonders of the underwater world.
He opened before humanity a new layer of reality, previously inaccessible and unsolved, despite serious progress, until now.
Thor Heyerdahl
In Norwegian, Tour sounds and is written exactly the same as Thor , so our hero is the namesake of the most important god of the Scandinavian pantheon. He conquered the Ocean not on an ultra-modern boat made of plexiglass and steel, but on a makeshift raft made of giant logs - exactly the same on which the ancient inhabitants of South America sailed, reaching the Polynesian islands on their fragile troughs.
The scientific community did not accept his ideas, so he proved everything empirically, going on a hundred-day sailing on a raft to the Raroia Islands. Having covered 4340 kilometers, Heyerdahl's team on the Kon-Tiki raft reached their goal, simultaneously filming the Oscar-winning "Expedition to Kon-Tiki" (1951 prize).
18 years later, he started another mind-blowing journey, trying to prove the possibility of overcoming the Atlantic Ocean in ancient Egyptian boats built from papyrus. The first trip to "Ra" ended in failure: before reaching 900 kilometers to Barbados, the boat sank. But the second voyage from Moroccan Casablanca to the coast of Barbados was crowned with success, taking a modest 57 days (a third faster than the voyage of Columbus). Yuri Senkevich, a citizen of the USSR and the next figure on the list, sailed as a doctor on a reed boat.
Yuri Senkevich
For decades Sienkiewicz led the cult "Film Travelers Club" and was involved in the article not only as Heyerdahl's doctor - his list is much more serious. It:
- As a medical researcher he went on the papyrus boats "Ra", "Ra-2" and "Tigris" (another madness of the Norwegian, this time in the Indian Ocean;
- visited the Vostok-12 Antarctic expedition, which set the task of studying human behavior in inhuman conditions;
- He underwent training for a flight into space to an orbital station.
Soviet citizens saw the world through the eyes of Senkevich, and the program was entered in the Guinness Book of Records for a dozen nominations.
Nikolay Drozdov
Nikolai Nikolaevich Drozdov has been reigning in the animal world for more than forty years, having displaced all the traditional kings and rulers of the animal world. An inveterate traveler, Paganel is in an armchair, telling with love about the animal world with all its amazing and amazing inhabitants - from elephants and graceful antelopes to sea reptiles, insects and poisonous snakes.
A man of amazing erudition, a favorite of a multi-million audience, listening to the story of which about the facts from the life of flying, running, crawling and the like was an incomparable pleasure. A funny moment: great-great-great-uncle served as the Moscow Patriarch under the name Filaret, and great-grandfather, Ivan Romanovich von Dreiling, was appointed orderly Mikhail Kutuzov.
With Drozdov, viewers traveled all over the planet, countless national parks and zoos, thoroughly studying the habitat, habits and habits of animals in their natural habitat, climbed Elbrus and Everest, twice went to the Pole and traveled on Yamal along the Northern Sea Route, participated in the unparalleled expedition to Jean Cousteau's Callisto.
Fedor Konyukhov
A lone discharger, who overcame the insurmountable and conquered the very elements, the first to be noted in five oceans, on the highest peaks of the world and at both poles. Forty expeditions (5 round the world), a single crossing across the Atlantic - moreover, 7 times.
The youngest member of the Union of Artists of the USSR and the author of a damn dozen books about his own adventures - Konyukhov does not intend to stop there. Next in line is a circumnavigation in 80 days, diving to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, flying around the Earth in a hot air balloon and various trips on flying, swimming and diving. And even the priesthood, adopted in 2010, is not a hindrance.
Bear Grylls
A relatively young English outstanding gentleman became famous for his highly rated program on "Discovery" called "Survive at any cost." The host presents the viewers with plans and views of charming and surprising places on the planet, along the way providing them with useful skills in case of emergencies and other troubles.
The list of his victories inspires: he bypassed the British Isles in thirty days on a kayak, crossed the Atlantic between Canada and Ireland on an inflatable raft, flew over Angel Falls on a steam plane, overcame the Himalayas using a paraglider. Most of Grills' madness is done for charity.
Abby Sunderland
Not only men are on our list - Abby Sunderland, for example, at the age of sixteen, alone covered half the globe, leaving the race in the last thousand miles. A separate curtsy to the girl's parents, because not everyone will be able to let their only daughter go to do such things.
The first start in January 2010 was unsuccessful, but the second attempt was almost crowned with success. At the end of the voyage on the boat, the power generation system broke down, the engine died and the hull leaked, not to mention the torn off antenna of the radio station. After a month of searching, the girl was declared missing, but the Australian coast guard accidentally discovered the missing yacht in the storm zone along with the brave captain ... the captain.
Jason Lewis
Lewis is a serious original. He spent 13 years traveling around the world, abandoning technology and, in principle, any achievements of civilization of the last hundred years. Only boat, bike and roller skates. Together with a friend named Stephen Smith, he sailed from Greenwich and four months later reached the coast of Canada, and then the guys drove all over America from east to west on roller skates. Next Hawaii (boat sailing) and pedalo (!!!) to get to the coast of Australia.
Having abstained, Jason did not lose heart. He earned the next leg of his Phileas Fogg-themed journey by selling printed T-shirts and sweatshirts. A couple of years - and he is in Singapore, from where, having traveled a piece of China , India, Iran and the restless Middle East, by 2007 our tourist pedaled to Africa, and then Europe, having visited the Balkans, Austria, Germany, Belgium and France. Even in the end, Lewis did not change his plan: he got to Foggy Albion by kayak with a single oar.
