There are little labels on most of the plants. An hour and a half is enough to see about two-thirds of the garden, walking up and down its slopes.

Two thirds is a good amount.

She's very thankful on the walk back, humming and bouncing happily. 

"You're welcome! I'm so glad you liked it."

"Yeah! It's really nicely big, too, our hometown had a botanical garden but it wasn't as huge."

"That one's very old. If it were being built today it'd have a hard time finding enough land to sit on."

"Huh! Yeah, I guess you guys don't have bunches of free space..."

"We do, but it'd be hard to grow a garden up in the arctic!"

She laughs. "Winters must get super cold if they're really long here, too..."

"It gets cold enough to snow almost everywhere in Voa."

"Snow's fun! But I like it best when it's not so much people can't get places, just enough for snow forts and snowball fights."

"Sometimes it gets very deep! We have snowplows that keep the roads clear, though."

"That's good!"

"Uh-huh! And many trains run underground, so they keep running just fine, and the ones that run aboveground we have ways to clear their tracks too."

"That's smart!"

"Trains are important enough that we need them to run year round! But it's spring now, it'll be a while before there's snow here unless we have a freak blizzard."

"That makes sense! It's gonna take some getting used to with such a super long year..."

"Is it? Do seasons matter a lot to you?"

"I don't think so? I get tired a lot and less energetic in the winter, but it's not a big difference? But I like going quickly through the seasons. Means by the time I'm bored with one it's the next, though I think I don't ever get bored with autumn..."

"There's school in winter, so hopefully you aren't too tired!"

"Hopefully not! What kind of school breaks are there? We had a summer break back in our hometown, and a smaller winter break."

"One year olds start school in the summer, so they can be home with their parents during the spring, and four year olds get most of spring off too so they can deal with springing for the first time - even the ones who don't spring till they're five, since we don't know who those are till they actually get there - but two and three year olds are in school every season, with breaks here and there of a week or a few weeks at a time."

"I think we used to have a lot more people who were farmers - and our town's still pretty rural - so the farming season isn't the school season, and the summer's hot sometimes too so it's unpleasant to be inside. And there's a big Christian holiday in the winter. But I think since our years are one of your seasons that makes sense? Having a whole one of our years off from school would be weird."

"Purple schools in farming areas might have different break structures, I don't know off the top of my head."

"Yeah, that'd make sense."

"I think more short breaks is nicer than one really long break probably anyways."

"It probably helps retention! I imagine you'd spend a lot of time on review if you took all your vacation at once every year."