We headed to Bergen, Norway, for our cruise to see the Northern Lights. Despite our combined 70 years of working at NASA, we had yet to think about what caused the lights. Due to my health issues, we focused more on walkers, canes, and how much time we needed to stand outside in the cold.
Storms
Storms delayed our flight from Houston to Paris and Paris to Amsterdam. Fortunately, the wind storms in Amsterdam delayed our flight from Amsterdam to Bergen, so we didn’t miss it. Every flight caused severe pain in my legs. Multiple enormous storms plagued the entire trip, but we did get to see the lights.
Solar Eruptions Cause the Northern and Southern Lights!
Viking carries historians, photographers, and scientists to give lectures for those who didn’t do research before travel.
The Sun expels large volumes of matter outward. Some get caught in the Earth’s magnetic field and are driven to the poles. We were taught that the Aroura Borealis (northern lights) and Aurora Australis (southern lights) might be white or invisible with just your eyes. The instructor said we would need Photoshop, even with a professional camera, to bring out the bright colors. We see the lights filtered by our atmosphere and weather, so NASA has the most precise, unaltered photos.
This NASA photo from the International Space Station shows the Sun with eruptions and solar matter piercing Earth’s atmosphere, creating the white, blue, green, and red lights.
NASA Science Space Place – Northern Lights
Find a video and a lesson on auroras at the NASA Science Space Place.
Finding the Northern Lights
We used two phone apps to predict when the eruptions occurred and the best time to view — IF the sky was dark and clear. Dark should have been easy. Daylight only lasted from 10 AM to about 3 PM. But the most significant flares were always around noon.
Fortunately, we went out on the top deck after lunch in Alta to see how long I could last in the cold. It took 2 minutes for extreme pain to develop in my legs and knock me out for the rest of the day. I needed more layers of pants even to take a photo.
I learned how to layer the clouds over the potential sightings of the aurora borealis in the phone apps and look for tiny cracks in the cloud cover. One late afternoon in Alta, I saw a skinny and long crack in the clouds layered over what should have been a dramatic light show in the sky.
I put on my three layers of pants and two coats. We went to the lounge at the front of the ship and waited.
The captain announced ship-wide: “Lights on the starboard side.” The lounge emptied to the attached deck, and we looked to the starboard side and saw nothing but clouds. But then someone yelled, “Cameras up,” and the lights appeared in the viewfinders like magic. The wispy lights swirled and changed shape. Those caught without cameras cozied up to those with phones or other big camera screens to see the lights.
That was our only sighting of the lights.
In addition to our sea days, we were supposed to spend two days in Bergen, two days in Alta, two days in Tromso, one day in Amsterdam, and fly home from London.
More Storms
But the storms kept us in Alta an extra day, and Tromso was as far south as the ship could travel safely. Multiple storm systems were trapping us in port; they were all the size we had endured on our cruise from Bergen to Quebec several years before.
It took Viking a couple of days to figure out a solution. Tromso has an “international” airport, but the runway is relatively short and icy. Viking eventually found a plane and crew in Poland certified for the Tromso airport. They scheduled flights over several days and packed us in those planes like sardines. Viking corporate managers flew in from wherever they were to help with the logistics.
Plan Another Trip!
Even though all the problems with the cruise were solely related to the weather, we received highly generous vouchers for a future cruise.
