Where does ABBYY Road lead

What summer is waiting for a man who works at ABBYY? Bright and filled with new experiences. To do this, back in 2008, we came up with “Summer with ABBYY” - a series of various trips, excursions and hikes. Each of us can find something to our liking - from excursions to the Red October and to the Central Museum of the Air Force in Monino to a beach volleyball tournament or SUP safari in Serebryanny Bor. Anyone can sign up and participate, and you can also call relatives, children and friends.

As a rule, our “Summer” begins at the end of May with the two-day motor rally ABBYY Road. And if you signed up for it, you will most likely get into the company of people who rarely overlap in work, from different projects and divisions - from developers, product owners and designers to lawyers and marketers. And during the trip, nothing prevents them from meeting. And still it is lazy to gather somewhere. It is much more convenient when more experienced travelers help to plan the route and arrange the trip.

In this post we will tell you a little about the history of ABBYY Road and the intricacies of organizing the rally, and then we will take you along the route of this year in the Lipetsk region, we will show the time, mileage, maps and something else. Go!


The first ABBYY Road was held in 2010. Then 32 travelers from ABBYY on 10 cars went for two days on the route Moscow - Sergiev Posad - Kalyazin - Uglich - Myshkin - Moscow, and the vice-president of ABBYY Aram Pakhchanyan (in the photo - from the right edge) led the rally. Since then, the routes have changed every year, but the essence of the journey remains the same. Meet, talk and make friends with colleagues, discover new places, wander around small Russian cities.
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The auto race always takes two days. On Saturday morning we leave the city to look at interesting places, spend the night in a hotel at the most distant point of the route and return to Moscow on Sunday evening.

Where we have not been in the past 9 years. Every year - a new route. Almost all directions covered. Share with you:

Who makes this all up?

This year, as always, the route of the rally we chose all together about 1.5-2 months before the trip. All comers gathered for a big meeting and shared ideas where you want to wave closer to the summer. Made 4 routes:

• Route 1 - "Memorable pages of history": Moscow - Mozhaysk - the source of the Moscow River - Gagarin - Vyazma / Smolensk - Borodino field.
• Route 2 - “In places of heroic glory”: Moscow - Kirzhach - Vladimir - Murom - Karacharovo - Gus Khrustalny.
• Route 3 - “Better mountains - only mountains”: Moscow - Kudykina Mountain - Elets - nature reserve “Galichya Gora” - Vorgolsky rocks.
• Route 4 - “Around and around Tver: reserved places”: Moscow - Klin - Konakovo GRES - Zavidovo - Torzhok - Rzhev.

A few days later, a vote was launched in the corporate social network and in a week they chose the most-most of all the options. It turned out to be the "mountain" route. Over 50 people voted for him. The second place was taken by a trip towards Mozhaisk. By the way, we are thinking of going there next year.

The same method we chose and places to spend the night. There were two options: small wooden houses in the territory of the park “Kudykina Gora” or a hotel in Yelets. It is not surprising that almost everyone wanted to spend a warm May evening not in the city, but in the park, in nature.

Few calculations

And now it's time to talk about several important features of ABBYY Road.

• As experience of past years has shown, a group of 11-13 crews can be the most mobile and organized. When there are more cars, it is difficult to keep up with all the excursions and activities in time.
• It is comfortable to participate in one rally 40-50 people. All will fit into one hotel, without problems will be divided into a couple of excursion groups (20-25 people each), all together will be able to eat in one cafe. If more people go, you will have to separate the participants, but you do not want to do this.
• In order for as many interested persons as possible to participate in ABBYY Road, the check-in always takes place twice, on the same route. This year we have chosen for travel on May 18-19 and June 8-9.
• "Horseless" participants will always find a place in one of the machines.
• Only one guest can be taken on a trip (a friend, girlfriend, relative. If you have several children, you can take them all).
• We always ask participants to count on their strength and sign up for the mileage, only if they are ready to drive or in a car for 5-6 hours. In the case of a trip to the Lipetsk region - 6-8 hours.
• We usually leave early - about 6-7 hours. Passengers agree in advance with the drivers how they will get to the venue.

How to sign up for a trip?

Since ABBYY Road is traditionally very popular, we, as usual, warned everyone about the start of the record on the rally. Accordingly, the next day, the participants had to fill out a small form and indicate on what dates they want to go, who among them wants to be a driver, who is a passenger, who will travel with them in one car and whether there will be empty seats in the crew. This time about 30 people signed up for the first two minutes. And in the next couple of days - another 39.

The group included the first 13 drivers and the first 33 passengers, including relatives, children and friends. The rest fell into the “waiting list” and moved from it to the main group when empty seats appeared in it (if one of the first registrants refused). A couple of weeks before the rally, we began to actively prepare. What exactly we did, we tell under the spoiler.

Go! First day: 400 km on the way, Elets and Kudykina mountain

The route of the first day of the rally on the map looked like this (by reference - a detailed description of the route with an approximate calculation of time).



Direction : Moscow - Yelets (Lipetsk region)
Distance : ~ 400 km
Travel time : ~ 3.5-4.5 hours

Our cars met at a gas station at the 21st km of the M-4 Don highway. Pasted on the car red stickers ABBYY Road, took the radio to be in touch, and go. From 7 to 10:30 we crossed the Moscow, Tula and Lipetsk regions. According to our recommendations, the participants acquired transponders (an electronic device for paying tolls on toll roads in special lanes. You can buy or take a transponder for a while), so as not to stop each time to pay for M-4 and not stand in lines of cars.

The Don track is good, and the permitted speed of movement on paid sections is from 90 to 130 km / h, so many arrived at Yelets around 10:30. This is 2.5 hours earlier than we had planned, so the guys went to explore the city on their own.

There are many unusual things in Yelets, for example, the streets in the center have two names: one is historical, the other is modern.



An excellent view of the Ascension Cathedral opens from the bridge over the Pine River:



Nothing special, just listen to an excursion on Mira Street in Elets:



Elec - a city with quiet streets, two-story merchant mansions. Looking at them is a fascinating activity:



We dined in the refectory of the Znamensky Monastery. Only the whole group was there. 30 liters of borscht, 50 servings of buckwheat and 100 slices of black bread were eaten.

“ We, after a tour of Yelets, returned to the monastery to plunge into the fonts. Lovers of extreme and intercepted spirit highly recommend. "
Alexander, developer of ABBYY

Destination : Elets - Kudykina Gora Safari Park
Distance : 48 km
Travel time : ~ 30-40 min

Remember the saying "To the mountains, steal tomatoes?" So, this place is located between Yelets and Zadonsky, at the bend of the Don River. True, it is not connected with the saying at all, and it looks like this:



Llamas, camels, goats, horses, and yaks are grazed on Kudykina Hill. You can pet ponies and horses:



In the evening, on one of the hills, Gorynych came to life and began to breathe fire.

“ Healthy lifestyles, diet, lack of alcohol and nicotine in the blood of tourists - all this provokes incredible heartburn from Gorynych. Fabulous hero is difficult to adapt to the modern world :-( "
Sergey, head of the product trainers group ABBYY

The participants of the next, June, ABBYY Road were lucky to swim in the Don - the water was already warm.



In the evening we rode bicycles, grilled kebabs, played on the boards.

Second day: Galich'ya Gora and Vorgolsky rocks

The route of the second day was more intricate (the link is a detailed route with an approximate calculation of time).



We start from Kudykina Mountain.
Direction : Kudykina Mountain - Galichya Mountain
Distance : 43 km
Travel time : ~ 30 minutes

The next day we went to see Galichia mountain - one of the smallest reserves in the world. He even got into the Guinness Book of Records. Here is a nursery of rare birds of prey. Falcon falcons and other endangered species are bred in it. And the birds from birth do not contact with people: for them create conditions as close as possible to the wild nature. Every year on the Galicia mountain several dozen falcons-falcons are released. Another part is sold to Arab countries, where the tradition of falconry has long existed. In addition, the falcons, born on Galich mountain, serve in Moscow airports: birds of prey scare migratory birds, which can interfere with the take-off and landing of aircraft.

In addition to falcons, owls, splushki, owl, goshawk, eagles and other birds live in the park. Some of them can be seen without cells at arm's length, but still it’s not worth pulling hands to them.


Goshawk

Direction : Galichya Gora - Argamach Park
Distance : 39 km
Travel time : ~ 30 minutes

We dined in the archaeological park Argamach, and after - we competed in archery and throwing spears. Even with a short distance to hit a spear, the goal is not an easy task.



Then we went to the village hut, where a local craftswoman weaves lace on the bobbins. We all were able to see how serious this work was. However, our girls decided to try.



And then we went for a walk. Outside was great weather. I immediately wanted to lie down in the tall grass and at the same time make the traditional common photo with ABBYY Road:



Direction : Argamach - Vorgolsky rocks
Distance : 38 km
Travel time : ~ 30 minutes

In the middle of the day we visited another beautiful place in the reserve Galichya gora - Vorgolsky rocks. On the way to them, we saw an old abandoned mill. You can get into it, but not for free, but for 100 rubles:



Past the mill flows the river Vorgol. Above one of its banks are 25-meter-high layered limestone cliffs.



Here you can take a walk, go climbing or just lie down, enjoying a great view:

Way back home

Direction : Vorgolskie cliffs - Moscow
Distance : 400 km
Travel time : 5 hours

I didn’t want to go home — there are so many impressions, energy and emotions you get from these places. After ABBYY Road, previously not familiar people no longer seem to be strangers, and I want to visit places that I recently found out about again and show my friends.

The result of our trip



Where are we going next year? Already thinking over the route. Want to join our team, develop artificial intelligence technologies and actively spend your free time? Come to us, we have vacancies .