Preparing for the Trip

I'm Kayla. I'm the GIS Specialist at the Missouri Botanical Garden (MBG). In just a few short hours Travis, a horticulturist at MBG, and I will be boarding a plane for the first leg of our journey to Russia. We have a scheduled 19 hours of travel time ahead of us, going from St. Louis to Chicago to Helsinki to Moscow. We will be joined by Brian, the Director of Horticulture at Naples Botanical Garden. We aren't entirely sure what to expect ahead of us, but Travis and I are both incredibly excited for the trip. Here is a general outline of what we will be doing the next two weeks:

July 30: Depart St. Louis @ 4 pm CST

July 31: Arrival in Moscow @ 7:30 pm local Moscow time (11:30 am CST)

August 01 - 03: Visits to Main Botanical Garden of Russian Academy of Science (Arboretum, Japanese garden, Rose garden, Flora of USSR exposition, New and Old greenhouse, Herbarium) and Botanical Garden of Moscow State University

August 04: flight Moscow-Apatity

August 05: Visit to Polar-Alpine Botanical Garden

August 06: Tour of the Khibiny Mountains

August 07: Lapland Biosphere Reserve

August 08: Kandalaksha Nature Reserve

August 09-10: Trip to Tersky Coast of White Sea and Varzuga

August 11: flight Apatity-Moscow

August 12: Cultural program (Visit to historical sites and museums of Moscow)

August 13: Departure to US @ 10:45 am local Moscow time; Arrive in St. Louis @ 11 pm CST

This is my first time traveling internationally. I do not know a lot of Russian, but I've got a few words memorized, a list of useful phrases, and my trusty offline Google translator on my phone. I will be chronicling our adventure here in this blog... or at least try to; I don't know what kind of internet connection we will have north of the Arctic Circle, but I will certainly try to keep things updated!

Our journey soon begins...