Northern Lights Trip

Glen_Quagmire

Want to bring the girlfriend away for a few days in October and the Northern Lights are high on the list.

Been looking on a few websites but still not sure what's the best move as there are so many options.

Any suggestions from anyone who's been to a good spot?

We wouldn't be into Skiing or anything just chilling and taking in the surroundings and having nice food and a few drinks in the evening.

Any suggestions appreciated

VandC

There are a few places that you can see them, but the further north you go the better chance you have. I went to tromso in norway, loved it. Flew with SAS airways to Oslo and then on to tromso.

I'm not going to try to sell tromso to you though, all I would say to you is don't make the northern lights the only thing about your trip. You are relying on the sun to do its thing, it hit the atmosphere, no clouds in the sky and of course to be in the right place at the right time. So ultimately you can't guarantee you will see them. You'll want your destination to tick other boxes too.

Research different places and have a look at what it has to offer. As one example, there was a company in tromso that offered northern light trips but you went dog sledding to see them. So it meant we left in the evening and were out for the night trying to chase the northern lights. That particular night cloud cover was heavy and it was snowing so no show as you can imagine but still a great experience had and memories made. Another thing I signed up for was to chase the northern lights but get a crash course in how to photograph them properly. I hope I'm explaining my point, these don't have to be things you do but when I organised my trip I wanted to be able to say I did this, that and the other when I can home and have memories just in case we weren't lucky (fortunately we got to see the lights four of the five nights we were there with one night particularly spectacular).

There are other places in Norway (can't remember the name of the place - think it begins with A, isn't too far from tromso and has an ice hotel) and the Scandinavian countries. There's also Iceland or if you wanted to go further you could consider Canada or Alaska.

Best of luck, mad jealous of you, would love to be going again

Glen_Quagmire

Thank you for the detailed reply. What hotel in Tromso did you stay in?

VandC

No problem, you're welcome. We stayed in the Radisson blu hotel. I booked it for it's location but it actually turned out that a lot of the excursions that we picked (coincidentally) had a pick up point there or literally around the corner so it saved having to find somewhere in a place we didn't know.

Just a heads up, Norway isn't cheap. Everyone harps on about how expensive drink is and I know at the time I was like "sure I'm not going on a drinking holiday" so I didn't mind that. But actually when I got there I couldn't get over just how expensive everything was. Just to put it in perspective, a whopper meal worked out at about 20euro (classy i know but we only had time to grab a quick late lunch) and a bottle of spar own brand 500ml water was something like 4euro. But all in all I don't regret it for a second. I went for the experience, the cost didn't sour it for me it was a dream holiday and I would have spent millions (if I had it lol). Just something to keep in mind if you want "fancy" dinners while you are out...

Check out the price of the excursions too, there are different rates for different times of the years. You can pay them in advance too so you would potentially only need to bring spending money with you, so it will help spread the cost. But of course, make sure you do your homework if you are booking/paying for anything in advance you don't want to fall victim to a scam. (I'm not saying this happened me or that I came across it, this would be generic advice I'd give anyone for any holiday). Bare in mind if you do sign up for activities they can start from 5 (i think that's the earliest I remember) so you might be having more late lunch/early dinner type meals. We actually found that we were only eating 2 meals a day. As some of the excursions didn't get back to the hotel until 2/3 in the morning we had a late breakfast, then a late lunch or early dinner depending on how you look at it, as the next night's activity was starting around 5/6 and then just a prepacked snack to keep going. One or two of the excursions we went on even provided the snacks!

Hope this helps.

uck51js9zml2yt

There is a thread in bargain alerts for doing it on a shoestring.

Fred Swanson

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VandC

I went in December. I wanted to experience the no sunrise bit too. I suppose by going that time of year I personally felt that I missed out on other excursions. Although they were running I thought doing some of the ferry trips, for example, to see whales wouldn't be worth it, given the very limited amount of light. But that was personal choice. Some obv do, otherwise they wouldn't be running (but they didn't seem very busy -still trying to drum up business as you walked past them)

Aristotle145

Whales are better on the dinner table.
Always bring some whalemeat back to Ireland when i go to Norway.

ED E

Rovaniemi in Finland is another option. One thing Id suggest is considering time of year. You can spend a few hours waiting for a solar storm to occur and then transit to earth AND have the clouds out of the way. In early September thats a little cool, by late October you're frozen to bits after 10 minutes even in ski gear. I'd strongly suggest going as early/late in the winter season as possible, the aurora happens all year but is just more visible when you get clear dark skies.

johnire

You could always consider going on a short cruise in Norway. We did a 2 week cruise last year(March and April) up and down the coast from Bergen to Kirkiness.
One of the highlights was seeing the Northern Lights a few times.
We went with Hurtigruten who were excellent and you don't have to worry about food as it's all included. I know they do short cruises from Bergen.
Good luck!

Fred Swanson

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Lackey

I recommend Iceland
Went in December, visited the Blue Lagoon and toured the Golden Circle, did pay to go Northern Lights Hunting but was unlucky .......However seen 'em for free from the hotel balcony the next night.
Stayed in Reykavik,
as said above you are not guaranteed the Northern Lights so pick somewhere you want to visit and if you get to see them its a bonus.
Iceland is expensive for food and drink but had a fantastic time there.

sillysocks

We also went to Tromso, stayed at the 'Clarion With' hotel.... no idea what the with is in the name for! What we good about the hotel was that it had breakfasts and an evening buffet included. As well as coffee/drinks and waffles in the afternoons. Now it wouldn't have been amazing good but some evenings when going on tours etc it was handy to have something quick before going out. And as the other poster said meals can be expensive so it did us fine.

We did a small lights tour which was great, just a small minibus rather than a big coach of people. It meant they are more flexible as to where to go (in fact you've to bring your passport if I remember right in case you leave Norway!) and also stay out as long as needed if they think lights will appear later. We also did the dog sledding and stayed overnight in a traditional Sami tent at that place and sledged again the next morning. Didn't see the lights that night but experience was still great.

There is another Clarion close to that one that looked nicer but that was more expensive so it depends on your budget etc.

We also flew via Oslo and actually on way back had to do Oslo to London to Dublin because we were stuck on a specific date coming home and there was no Oslo Dublin flight.

fits

March is the best month to see them in Finland, in my experience at least. Its more active around the equinoxes and the weather is better in March than October (i.e less cloudy)