@ExtraMedium@Kyeh
I keep seeing AMAZING deals to Iceland for trip and lodging packages on Travelzoo. So far haven’t gone, but now with Mom moved to my sister’s maybe I can snag on of those. Gonna have to wait a bit since I have about 8 trips planned in the next 14 months!
That being said, I have seen the AB during our time in MN on the Canadian border (eh). It was truly a site to behold.
@chienfou@ExtraMedium Nice! I keep getting offers from Iceland Air, just because I entered a contest a while back for a flight (didn’t win.) We were there overnight decades ago - we didn’t see the AB, but we experienced the midnight sun, so uncanny.
@ExtraMedium Your pictures are nice, but even the best photos and/or videos don’t seem to do it much justice compared with the full bore light show it can be at times.
Thanks for sharing!
PA
I worked in NW Ontario and we saw them year round. Most of the time we had just the green ones but occasionally there were ones with other colors. They can light up a huge portion of the sky at times. Once canoeing from the Black Sturgeon River to Gull Bay on Lake Nipigon (the canoes were rafted up on the lake and we canoed all night) we watched them the entire night. I never got tired of seeing them. I saw them several times from an airplane as well. They are one of the more amazing things you can see in the night sky. Between them and just how many stars you can see away from any city lights the night sky is pretty amazing. In the winter it was only light from about 9:30 or 10am - around 3ish pm so lots of night to see them in.
Also with the snow in the winter all sound was so muffled that if you stood still you could hear your heart beat. And the sound of the ice shifting in the lakes. A sound like when you blow across a glass pop bottle would go zipping along the cracks in the lake’s ice.
These are some of the more amazing things I experienced living there that year - well along with 40 to 60 F below at night with outhouses, no running water (took all day to get it from the lake where the ice was 8’ deep or deeper) or electricity; where if you put your wet jeans outside to dry the ice sublimates and if you are stupid enough to hit them against a tree to get any icicles off the legs of the jeans breaks off (ask me how I know that ), where when you put the wood on the fire (heating by wood) and don’t thaw it first it puts the fire out… It was amazing to take students cross country skiing with dog teams and camp out in that. Something I am very glad I experienced once (although perhaps not twice).
Saw them one year outside Ottawa Illinois. Was up with my girlfriend at her parents’ house and went out away from the city lights to see it. She thought we were going to make out and was disappointed. I knew the Aurora didn’t make it that far south very often. Needless to say it was a long, quiet trip home the next day, but that’s one of the more positive things I can say about that relationship…
Many times. A lot of people have seen the AB without really realizing it because a calm aurora can look like dull green bands of clouds. I was on military flights running west at night after refueling in Fairbanks, and east at night out of Goose Bay, Labrador. One winter night an hour or so out of Goose Bay en route to London, the AB decided to put on a light show. One big green band and an adjacent smaller one started a flare. It looked like a couple of bonfires coming to life, upward (or really, spaceward) from the green in yellow, orange, red, and blue-violet. It only lasted a couple of minutes before it subsided back to the swirling green bands. I’ve seen a couple of smaller flares, but that one was the most spectacular. Everyone was asleep on the plane except a couple of passengers and presumably at least one pilot. That was one time when my inability to sleep on planes paid off.
Back in the long-ago, the Aurora Borealis was visible even in the southern states when there was a flare. Now, light pollution from urban areas blocks it from view unless you are in the open away from cities or far enough north.
Boundary Waters, circa 2005. Middle of a two week long group canoeing and fishing adventure. We’d picked the most comedically small island we could find that would plausibly fit all our tents, food totes, and canoes onto that night. I am crushed that I can no longer find the photos. It looked like a clown campout.
We’re cooking a nice fat bass as one of the group is hilariously mangling some Judas Priest on a ukulele, and my dad leans back and wistfully says, “You know, I’d really like to see the northern lights before I die.”
Someone from one of the other boats looks up and says, “Hey, what’s that?”
Sure enough, it’s the Aurora Borealis hanging down.
Dad wasn’t allowed to do anything dangerous the rest of the trip.
Is that anything like the warm glow of burning hydrogen?
@yakkoTDI I think it’s more like napalm. I could be mistaken though.
Still seeking the bore aurorealis.
/youtube I Ran (So Far Away)
Aurora Borealis comes in view
Aurora comes in view
@growyoungagain Thanks for the ear worm
@growyoungagain @tweezak just heard it in Savers yesterday… great, another 24 hrs
@tweezak @ybmuG I’m saddened by the passing of Matthew Perry, I remember the ep.of Chandler in college wearing a Flock of Seagulls hairdo to a party.
@growyoungagain @ybmuG
You apparently didn’t run quite far enough away.
I lived in Iceland for a bit. I have a few photos of the auroras from that time, and subsequent trips back there. It’s pretty wild.
@ExtraMedium I hope you’ll post some of those pictures when you have time!
@Kyeh Not my best work, photographically speaking, but I really grabbed 'em as proof I saw it for my family back in the US.
The bright spot is the moon.
Clouds lit it all up more.
My best shot from 2006
And these two were out the window of my most recent trip back to Iceland.
@ExtraMedium Thanks! That third one is spectacular!
@ExtraMedium @Kyeh
I keep seeing AMAZING deals to Iceland for trip and lodging packages on Travelzoo. So far haven’t gone, but now with Mom moved to my sister’s maybe I can snag on of those. Gonna have to wait a bit since I have about 8 trips planned in the next 14 months!
That being said, I have seen the AB during our time in MN on the Canadian border (eh). It was truly a site to behold.
@chienfou @ExtraMedium Nice! I keep getting offers from Iceland Air, just because I entered a contest a while back for a flight (didn’t win.) We were there overnight decades ago - we didn’t see the AB, but we experienced the midnight sun, so uncanny.
@ExtraMedium Your pictures are nice, but even the best photos and/or videos don’t seem to do it much justice compared with the full bore light show it can be at times.
Thanks for sharing!
PA
Who’s so blasé that they don’t care?!!
What about these options?
Lots of times…on tv
I worked in NW Ontario and we saw them year round. Most of the time we had just the green ones but occasionally there were ones with other colors. They can light up a huge portion of the sky at times. Once canoeing from the Black Sturgeon River to Gull Bay on Lake Nipigon (the canoes were rafted up on the lake and we canoed all night) we watched them the entire night. I never got tired of seeing them. I saw them several times from an airplane as well. They are one of the more amazing things you can see in the night sky. Between them and just how many stars you can see away from any city lights the night sky is pretty amazing. In the winter it was only light from about 9:30 or 10am - around 3ish pm so lots of night to see them in.
Also with the snow in the winter all sound was so muffled that if you stood still you could hear your heart beat. And the sound of the ice shifting in the lakes. A sound like when you blow across a glass pop bottle would go zipping along the cracks in the lake’s ice.
These are some of the more amazing things I experienced living there that year - well along with 40 to 60 F below at night with outhouses, no running water (took all day to get it from the lake where the ice was 8’ deep or deeper) or electricity; where if you put your wet jeans outside to dry the ice sublimates and if you are stupid enough to hit them against a tree to get any icicles off the legs of the jeans breaks off (ask me how I know that
), where when you put the wood on the fire (heating by wood) and don’t thaw it first it puts the fire out… It was amazing to take students cross country skiing with dog teams and camp out in that. Something I am very glad I experienced once (although perhaps not twice).
Saw them one year outside Ottawa Illinois. Was up with my girlfriend at her parents’ house and went out away from the city lights to see it. She thought we were going to make out and was disappointed. I knew the Aurora didn’t make it that far south very often. Needless to say it was a long, quiet trip home the next day, but that’s one of the more positive things I can say about that relationship…
I should try to see them sooner than later. My eyesight is getting worser and worserer…
Many times. A lot of people have seen the AB without really realizing it because a calm aurora can look like dull green bands of clouds. I was on military flights running west at night after refueling in Fairbanks, and east at night out of Goose Bay, Labrador. One winter night an hour or so out of Goose Bay en route to London, the AB decided to put on a light show. One big green band and an adjacent smaller one started a flare. It looked like a couple of bonfires coming to life, upward (or really, spaceward) from the green in yellow, orange, red, and blue-violet. It only lasted a couple of minutes before it subsided back to the swirling green bands. I’ve seen a couple of smaller flares, but that one was the most spectacular. Everyone was asleep on the plane except a couple of passengers and presumably at least one pilot. That was one time when my inability to sleep on planes paid off.
Back in the long-ago, the Aurora Borealis was visible even in the southern states when there was a flare. Now, light pollution from urban areas blocks it from view unless you are in the open away from cities or far enough north.
Boundary Waters, circa 2005. Middle of a two week long group canoeing and fishing adventure. We’d picked the most comedically small island we could find that would plausibly fit all our tents, food totes, and canoes onto that night. I am crushed that I can no longer find the photos. It looked like a clown campout.
We’re cooking a nice fat bass as one of the group is hilariously mangling some Judas Priest on a ukulele, and my dad leans back and wistfully says, “You know, I’d really like to see the northern lights before I die.”
Someone from one of the other boats looks up and says, “Hey, what’s that?”
Sure enough, it’s the Aurora Borealis hanging down.
Dad wasn’t allowed to do anything dangerous the rest of the trip.