Northern Lights...

[summerstars]

Hey. I'm just looking at Northern Lights holidays, and I was wondering if anyone had seen them in Reykjavik, Iceland? Is there somewhere I can get a better look?

Thanks. 

Vikki x

[Scooot]

Hey. I'm just looking at Northern Lights holidays, and I was wondering if anyone had seen them in Reykjavik, Iceland? Is there somewhere I can get a better look?

Thanks.

Vikki x

My son just went there for a long weekend. He went on a northern lights tour whilst there but was unlucky due to cloud. However they offer you a free tour if you don't see them so they tried again on the second night but the same. If he goes back there apparently it's still valid. Northern norway is meant to be good as well, I'm going on a cruise up there next march and hoping to see them.

[summerstars]

My son just went there for a long weekend. He went on a northern lights tour but was unlucky due to cloud. However they offer you a free tour if you don't see them so they tried again on the second night but the same. If he goes back there apparently it's still valid. Northern norway is meant to be good as well, I'm going on a cruise up there next march and hoping to see them.

Thanks, will have a look. Hoping to go around November time. Hopefully it won't be cloudy for us! x

[Umbraldot]

It's all a gamble. You book tour trip and hope. I went to Norway and cruised from Bergen through the Arctic circle to the North Cape. Fabulous trip but loads of cloud and one very feeble aurora seen on a very cloudy night.

So no aurora really, I've seen far better from the UK! Great trip and no regrets but you travel with no guarantees. As long as you adopt that approach, it will be a great experience and if you see an aurora...well a bonus.

[summerstars]

It's all a gamble. You book tour trip and hope. I went to Norway and cruised from Bergen through the Arctic circle to the North Cape. Fabulous trip but loads of cloud and one very feeble aurora seen on a very cloudy night.

So no aurora really, I've seen far better from the UK! Great trip and no regrets but you travel with no guarantees. As long as you adopt that approach, it will be a great experience and if you see an aurora...well a bonus.

Sadly, I missed the UK ones as my aurora watch emails went to junk :-( I don't have high expectations about seeing it. Just nice to get away, along with the chance of seeing. Fingers will be crossed the whole time though! :-) x

[Scooot]

They had a great time in Iceland ( 2 nights) even though they never saw the aurora, never been there myself. Bathing in the Blue Lagoon seemed to be one of the highlights, apparently this thermal spring provides all the hot water and heating for most of the population as well as being a great tourist attraction.

[summerstars]

They had a great time in Iceland ( 2 nights) even though they never saw the aurora, never been there myself. Bathing in the Blue Lagoon seemed to be one of the highlights, apparently this thermal spring provides all the hot water and heating for most of the population as well as being a great tourist attraction.

Sounds amazing! I may have to give the Blue Lagoon a go too! x

[Umbraldot]

Sadly, I missed the UK ones as my aurora watch emails went to junk :-( I don't have high expectations about seeing it. Just nice to get away, along with the chance of seeing. Fingers will be crossed the whole time though! :-) x

During the previous solar cycle maximum (2001/2002) I saw two amazing aurora from North Yorkshire so not very far from your location.

[Boonp]

I have been on the Northern lights flight from Stansted approx 3.5 hours flight time we did see the Northern lights and it was a good experience.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[neural]

Hi Vikki,

We were in Reykjavik a few weeks ago (end of March - beginning of April). We went on a northern lights tour, twice, and didn't see them. We didn't mind though, because we'd seen them from our bedroom window the night we arrived! I also made myself a bit unpopular by oohing and aahing at the night sky views through my 7x50s while everyone else was standing in the snow moaning about no aurora. 

My advice would be, definitely go to Iceland, it's an amazing place, and if you see the aurora it's a bonus, but there's so much else to do, unlike some other aurora-hunting places. You do have to pick your time of year though. To get any decent aurora/astro opportunities you really have to go between the autumn and spring equinoxes, but it gets seriously cold in the deep winter, many roads are impassable and many tours don't run. If I was going again I'd go for the nearest new moon to early March or late September-early Oct. 

[dick_dangerous]

I was in Iceland last year, staying in a summer house just north of Akranes, on the other side of the Whale Fjord from Reykjavík. We got to see the Aurora from a picnic site somewhere out on the Snaefellsnes peninsula and it really was an awesome sight.

Iceland would be my first choice for an aurora holiday - if you don't see them, the rest of the country is so awesome that you'll have a great time anyway. If possible go for a week or longer and hire a car - be prepared to travel a little way to see them. The Icelandic met office has an aurora forecast on their website: http://en.vedur.is/weather/forecasts/aurora/ - it also shows the cloud cover across Iceland. We realised that if we were 50km north of where we were staying then we'd get clear skies, so deliberately planned our day to try and catch it.

Good luck, and enjoy Iceland if you make it out there - it's like nowhere else on Earth...

DD

[jason.p]

We went to an ice chapel wedding in Finnish Lapland a few years ago, (200 miles inside the arctic circle), where the Northern lights are seen frequently. Unfortunately there was a full moon which washed everything out. I was gutted. It was only the Northern lights which persuaded us to go in the first place .

Apart from that, it is an amazing place, so long as you go before the ice starts melting and the midges move in!

[scarp15]

I have seen the aurora in Norway a few years ago whilst on a spring ski touring trip between mountain huts, which had involved some travel after night fall. As others have said a bit of a chance encounter even in Scandinavia. I have also seen it whilst camping out in the Cheviots in Northumberland, so you do not necessarily have to travel so far.

[acey]

If I were choosing a destination on the basis of likelihood of seeing northern lights then I'd probably go for northern Canada (in winter). But I wouldn't choose a destination on that basis - as others have said it's very hit and miss. And I've seen lots of aurorae from northern England, including one or two very spectacular ones over the last fifteen years or so.

I'm sure Iceland is a great place to visit, and if you happen to see an aurora while you're there, so much the better. Bear in mind that they never look the way they do in photographs. It's the same as Hubble images compared with the view through a telescope - the real thing is much fainter and unlikely to have any colour other than green/blue. Still pretty awesome, though.

What I'd really like to see is the Gegenschein...

[houston]

I done a 2 week cruise a few weeks ago from bergen to alta. Didnt see anything but clouds for 2 weeks. Booked lapland for feb. Check a lunar calender before you book as the moon will wash out the view.

[scarp15]

If I were choosing a destination on the basis of likelihood of seeing northern lights then I'd probably go for northern Canada (in winter). But I wouldn't choose a destination on that basis - as others have said it's very hit and miss. And I've seen lots of aurorae from northern England, including one or two very spectacular ones over the last fifteen years or so.

I'm sure Iceland is a great place to visit, and if you happen to see an aurora while you're there, so much the better. Bear in mind that they never look the way they do in photographs. It's the same as Hubble images compared with the view through a telescope - the real thing is much fainter and unlikely to have any colour other than green/blue. Still pretty awesome, though.

What I'd really like to see is the Gegenschein...

What are the prospects for glimpsing / seeing the Gegenschein from UK or Northern Hemisphere skies? Also termed as Counterglow, faint, elliptical / oval patch of light that appears opposite the Sun, created by reflection of sunlight by meteoric material in space. Best seen only in the absence of moonlight and light pollution and with dark adapted eyes, it can be lost in the light of the milkyway.

The Zodical Light I believe to be a similar phenomena and perhaps more of a Southern Hemisphere occurrence, sunlight reflected by interplanetary dust mostly along the line of the Zodiac and Ecliptic plane, best seen after twilight.

[lukebl]

If you're sticking to Europe, I'd go for Northern Norway, rather than Iceland. It's further North, and the Auroral 'halo' seems to generally be overhead at Tromso most of the time. I went there in January last year, and the aurora was showing every night. You might have to travel inland a bit to get away from the cloud, though.

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

I'll "have to" go to Iceland in May next year (conference), and really hope to see an aurora, as I have never been lucky in spotting them

[lukebl]

I'll "have to" go to Iceland in May next year (conference), and really hope to see an aurora, as I have never been lucky in spotting them

Shame. May. Hardly any darkness!

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Shame. May. Hardly any darkness!

True. I think it is in early May, but still

[Skipper Billy]

My eldest son lived in Iceland for two years and rarely saw the Aurora - he came home on 24th Feb and three days later we got this in our back garden!!!

[cotterless45]

Have a look at "Glendale Skye Auroras" on Facebook, this shows what is possible from Skye. I've been lucky enough to see seven displays. You'll need a nice calm frosty night with no Moon and plenty solar activity, then it begins,

Nick.

[summerstars]

Thanks everyone. All advice is being taken on board and I will definitely do my research before booking. I don't fully expect to see it, will make sure I find plenty of other things to do whist there just in case. :-) x

[houston]

Plenty to do in norway but really expensive. Husky safari's, snow mobiles and the scenery is amazing.

[summerstars]

I quite fancy the Blue Lagoon, so I reckon it's definitely going to be Iceland. Just need to find out when is best to go. Can't wait to book! x