Tag: Northern Lights

It was mostly clear last night, but there was zero solar activity so the lights didn’t make an appearance. We can’t complain given the three clear nights with Auroras that we’ve gotten, but during our visit we’ve also had two clear nights with minimal activity and two cloudy nights with high activity. The Aurora app just fired again to let us know that current solar activity is the strongest yet during our trip, as snow continues to fall and thick clouds cover the sky; there’s a chance of “partly cloudy” weather around midnight, so we’ll keep an eye on things to see if we get lucky and have one final show.

Given the snow today we hunkered down in our log cabin, with a brief foray outside to visit the birds. We’re off early tomorrow morning to get back to Fairbanks and hop on a plane home, but it’s been a successful trip – I was hoping for at least one good night of lights and we got that, and we also got a chance to run with reindeer, ride snow machines, and soak in hot springs, so all-in-all not a bad way to spend a week in the Far North.

One of Audrey’s only requests for the trip was that we ride snowmobiles snow machines (as the Alaskans call them), something that I was more than willing to do, but not excited about. It turns out that in this case, I was very, very wrong to not be excited – snow machines are incredibly fun. We were in a group with a guide and three other very tentative riders, but luckily Audrey and I were at the back of the group so we could lag behind and then gun the engines to catch back up; we discovered that our machines maxed out at 50mph. The trip lasted an hour and went through forests and along groomed trails, ending back at Rod’s Alaskan Guide Service where six teams of enthusiastic sled dogs were excitedly waiting for their next tours – we didn’t sign up for a dog sledding tour, but it was surprising seeing how much the dogs obviously LOVED pulling the sleds.

Last night, as expected the Northern Lights were hidden behind clouds, but the forecast for tonight is for clear skies so we’ll give it another try. A big storm is supposed to roll in late tonight and dump snow for the next two days, which should make our return drive to the airport more interesting. Thankfully our route back to Fairbanks is mainly along the start of the Haul Road, which is the road that semis take 500 miles up to the oil fields in Prudhoe Bay, so even if the plows aren’t running I’m told that the trucks mostly pack down the snow and keep the roads drivable.

Finally, in lieu of more Aurora photos, today’s pictures are of the fearless black-capped chickadees that are constantly at the feeder in front of our cabin.

We had our second best night of Aurora viewing last night, and finally crawled into bed very tired but very happy around 1am when clouds started moving in. Sadly we had to check out of the Aurora Borealis Lodge today, but we now have an old trapper cabin for three nights. The cabin lacks the vast views of the horizon that we enjoyed at our last lodging, but makes up for it with the massive logs used in its construction and a bird feeder in the front that is apparently the favorite spot for every chickadee that remained in the state for winter.

Now that temperatures are near or even slightly above zero we’ve added more activities to the schedule. Today’s adventure was a trip to Running Reindeer Ranch, where you roam around in the snow while an incredibly fired up herd of ten reindeer run all around you, digging in the snow, weaving through the people, and occasionally walking up for a pat. Much to Audrey’s delight, not only was hugging reindeer not discouraged, it was actually encouraged, and thus today’s reindeer hugging session may go down as her trip highlight. My main takeaway from the afternoon was that a) reindeer can get the zoomies and b) reindeer with the zoomies are REALLY amusing.

Weather forecasts are calling for clouds the next three nights, but if it is clear we’ve got our Arctic gear and cameras at the ready.

As predicted, clouds hid the Northern Lights from us last night, but I was actually grateful to be able to get some sleep after several late nights. In lieu of new photos, the picture below is the second of two rocket launches from Monday night. The rockets launched thirty seconds apart and were designed to do things that the very smart people at NASA can explain far better than I can, so read this article if you’re interested in what Earth observation scientists are doing these days.

Today temperatures rose nearly thirty degrees to an almost-comfortable 10F, so we hopped in the car and made the 90 minute one-way trip out to Chena Hot Springs. There’s something very soothing about unleashing your inner Japanese snow monkey and relaxing in a hot spring surrounded by snow and ice, with steam pouring off of the water and freezing almost instantly thereafter. While not a problem for me, the visitors who still had hair on their head all had frozen strands as the steam condensed and turned to wispy ice. Final verdict: not a bad way to spend a few hours.

Clouds are threatening again tonight, although at the moment the sky is more than half clear so we’re not sure how the evening will go. It’s sadly our last night at the Aurora Borealis Lodge, but we still have three nights remaining in the trip that we’ll be spending at an old trapper cabin that is only a few miles away as the crow flies, but 45 minutes away as the Alaskan roads run.

Last night the skies were perfectly clear, but there was literally no Aurora activity – the “solar power output” graph on the Aurora app that we’ve been using had dropped straight down to essentially zero. We still kept a watch out from our room, but I finally dozed off around midnight, and Audrey was in bed a short time later. Then at 1am the voice of Mok, the lodge’s owner, crackled over the room’s walkie talkie to say that there were lights visible in the west. Half awake, I stumbled to the window, and apparently the solar forecast had changed because the most intense band of Auroras that we’ve yet seen was dancing quickly across the sky. I woke Audrey up, grabbed my camera, threw on my Arctic gear, and then spent the next hour braving -20F to photograph the best Northern Lights display that we’ve seen so far.

Adding to the magic, the universe apparently has me confused for someone with a surplus of good karma, and thus enhanced the cosmic wonders by launching two rockets from the nearby Poker Flats Research Range. I was looking away when the first one shot into the air and didn’t catch a photo, but it was a neat sight seeing Auroras with a rocket streaking through them, followed a few seconds later by a massive roar of sound.

Tonight the Aurora forecast is for high activity, but unfortunately the sky is entirely covered by clouds, so our odds of seeing anything seem low. Nonetheless, as last night proved, anything can happen, so we’ll be up watching the skies again this evening.

Seeing the Northern Lights requires two things: solar activity and clear skies. We’ve been lucky on the clear skies so far – one of the advantages of visiting in February is that there are more clear nights – but a downside of clear skies is that a lack of clouds leads to MUCH colder nights; tomorrow will be our third straight day where temps are around -20F. Solar activity hasn’t been particularly high, but there is still enough that the lights are visible in the evenings, with occasional bursts that light up the horizon for thirty minutes at a time.

Aside from late night light shows we didn’t do much today given the cold. Once it had warmed up to a still-deadly -10F we hopped in the car and took a drive to see the snow-covered landscape, the F-35s at Eilsen Air Force Base, the art and taxidermy at the Knotty Shop, Santa’s Workshop in North Pole (which ironically is south of us), and then we resupplied in Fairbanks before returning to our warm room for another evening of Aurora photography.