The Department of Geography in the College of Natural Resources is planning a study tour this summer from July 22 through Aug. 6 called ?World Landscapes: Atlantic Canada.?

The tour will be teaching a self-contained geography class at the graduate and undergraduate levels, GEOG 4984 and GEOG 5984, traveling from Nova Scotia to Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, said Bill Carstensen, geography professor.

Students will begin the tour through the Annapolis Valley, at the Tidal Bore in the Bay of Fundy, focusing on historical, cultural and geographic history. Next, the tour will move through Halifax and Price Edward Island where the tour will stop at First Nations, then continue through to study aquaculture.

Newfoundland is the next main destination, where the tour will study glacial landscapes, Anglican landscapes and the Tablelands, just to name a few, said Lynn Resler, geography professor.

?This trip is interesting because it's very physical,? said John Boyer, geography instructor. ?We will focus on environment, terrain and landscape by hiking most of the time.?

Resler said he is also looking forward to the ?long hikes in the Long Range Mountains of Western Newfoundland (Gros Morne National Park) where there is a world heritage site because the exposure of the ocean mantle on the land, and meeting with the tribal representatives of local First Nations societies.?

Teaching the courses are geography professors Resler, Boyer, Carstensen and Bob Morrill, tour instructor, along with experts from local universities in Canada.

The Canadian tour differs from traditional study abroad methods because professors traveling from Virginia Tech are not experts of the area. Instead, Tech is employing local professors, historians and environmentalists, Boyer said.

Anyone can sign up for the study tour, but geography students will get preference. To sign up for the tour, students should contact Carstensen.

Faculty members have developed a course this semester to prepare students for the trip, Boyer said. This class was also designed to cut down on the cost of the trip, which is $1,200 without meals and airfare to and from Halifax.

?It's not economically conducive for students to take extra classes and pay more,? Boyer said.

The class during the spring makes it possible to split the courses for the tour so that the overall cost will be less.

This is the first of the World Landscapes travel courses that the Department of Geography plans to offer every year in conjunction with the Office of International Research, Education and Development. ?It is likely that a different trip will be run each year, each headed by a different team of faculty,? Carstensen said.

Plans for future trips that are in the brainstorming stages include a tour of the United States and Canada, the United Kingdom and the Dominican Republic.

Morrill and Carstensen traveled the route of the study tour last summer and met with the local leaders there, who are geography faculty from the Atlantic Provinces. The last five World Landscapes study tours across the United States and Canada were great learning experiences, Carstensen said.

?This tour is new, but it will be a success,? Carstensen said. ?The landscapes and people are fantastic on this trip. Like many study abroad courses, it will be a life-changing experience for the students who participate.?

Instructors said they hope students will learn from the rich environment and culture of Atlantic Canada.

?The only way to completely understand more about cultures is traveling abroad,? Boyer said. ?This is more about the experience than anything else.?