The Northern Lights chase requires some homework

There are plenty of tour operators offering Northern Lights Chase. In the city, there are 3-4 spots in Tromso from where the Northern Lights are visible including the viewing platform at Storsteinen and Telegrafbukta beach. On the day of our arrival in Tromso, I was told the chances are excellent to view Northern Lights. So I went up the cable car to Storsteinen.The sky was clear for a while which raised our hopes but alas, the clouds covered the sky in no time and it started raining. So no luck on Day 1.

The next day, I a took a bigger bus that was equipped with a toilet.

Required conditions to view northern lights..

Our guide explained the 3 conditions that must be satisfied to view Northern Lights:

1) The level of solar activity….greater the activity, better it chances. But solar activity is very hard to predict.

2) The weather. The sky should be clear.

3) Darkness. There should be no ambient light, the view point should be a dark area.

..but still a matter of chance

But even if all 3 conditions are taken care of, there is still no guarantee you will see Northern Lights. That brings us to the fouth intangible factor called luck. Aurora and weather forecasts are released everyday and updated, and these can serve as a planner, though the forecasts often turn out to be incorrect. I have had a first hand experience of weather being different than what was predicted!

The guide keeps tracking the weather and aurora forecast and makes a stop wherever the sky is very clear. And if the weather changes, we move on to the next stop. I suspect all operators have few predesignated stops. We made 3 stops with halts lasting from 15 minutes to 45 minutes before getting lucky with the 4^thstop.

Finally, the northern lights

This was on the shores of a lake little after 11PM when the guide suddenly pointed at the sky and announced formation of Northern Lights. And there it was-I could clearly see bright bands of light at about 75 degree which was spreading across the sky rapidly and got bigger and bigger. It appeared white in color but when the photograph was taken, it was green! The guide explained that Northern Lights colors(green is most common, others are pink, yellow, violet etc) are generally not visible to the naked eye, unless the activity level is very high.

The view of northern lights charged me up

For about 45 minutes, the entire group was charged up. Lot of pictures were clicked before the lights started dissipating. It was close to midnight when we started heading back to Tromso. The entire trip lasted abut 7 hours, with 5 hours being spent driving!

Key learnings

Two key learnings from this trip…one is that DSLR cameras can be better than human eye and secondly, without a guide, I would have missed Northern Lights all together. The trick is you need to keep taking pictures of the sky whenever bright lights appear.

The forecasts for the next 3 days were not good at all and I was told I was unlikely to see anything more than what had been seen. Hence, I did not take another trip. A single trip can cost upwards of ~INR 10k per adult though some operators offer discount for second and subsequent trips.

Which tour is good?

There are a variety of tours available for Northern Lights chase-big bus, small bus, private car, and boat. The only reason I chose the big bus is because of the toilet facility as the trip duration is 7 hours or more. I was not confident of being able to answer nature’s call if needed with outside temperatures at zero degrees, plus the many layers of clothes I was wearing!

One can also rent a car but I think a guide is necessary, at least the first time.

Is it worth it?

Overall, I must admit I was very happy but there was a hint of disappointment also. Having travelled all the way from India and having read and seen the pictures of Northern Lights, no where did anyone comment that the colors are not always visible to the naked eye. Looking at the above pictures, I am sure all of you feel I was lucky! But the whole experience of travelling to a town above the Artic circle was worth it.