Most Magical Birthday
It’s a grand start to life at 62 up here in the Arctic. Most folks head south to vacation in warmer climes from places like Stavanger. This year is predicted to be the final year of the solar maximum, and we’ve never seen the northern lights. This suggests a trip even further north is the direction to head, while the nights are long, to the land of auroras.
We chose a resort hotel, aptly named the Aurora Borealis Observatory, on the Norwegian island of Senja which is 3° above the arctic circle at the 69° parallel. As a reference, Portland is at 45°, Los Angeles is 35° and Miami is 25°. It’s really far north.
Location of Aurora Borealis Observatory
The weather was predicted to be quite horrible the entire visit, so we convinced ourselves that this will be a lovely getaway birthday vacation even if we never see any auroras.
Once settled in, on the eve of my birthday, I adventured out with my Galaxy S24 Ultra and Xenvo Squidgrip tripod with hopes of spotting anything resembling unusual sky activity. I must admit colorblindness makes aurora hunting quite difficult in the presence of wispy clouds. I find the darkest corner behind a building nearby and sure enough see the hints of un-cloud like smears. My camera obediently reveals a subtle, yet undeniable aurora. In shear excitement, I sprinted back barely worrying about ice patches to get Dominique and Kai. I led them to that same dark spot. They were so underwhelmed, they lasted all of 15 seconds before returning to warmth.
Barely visible aurora from just outside our apartment at Aurora Borealis Observatory
From the sleeper couch in front of the north facing giant picture window, Kai had the best vantage for aurora sightings, so we instructed him to wake us up if he happens to spot anything in the night.
At 3 a.m. on my birthday, Kai shouts “I see auroras” down the hall towards our bedroom. We rush to the living area and experience the full awe of our first unmistakable aurora.
I rushed to put on many layers of warmth and rushed out into the wee hours to get better shots. After half an hour of sky scanning, I never captured anything as majestic as what we witnessed from inside our apartment.
At 10 a.m., after a hearty hot breakfast in the main building, Kai and I headed out with a pack full of winter gear and snacks for an ambitious hiking adventure to the nearest peak, Rubbestadtfjell, where I can “check in” via the Fjelltopjakten (“Mountain Top Hunt”) mobile app. After all, how amazing would it be to earn a checkmark in the arctic! A circuitous road route does exist, but I’m not excited about just hiking highway, secondary and gravel roads to Rubbestadtfjell. There are no established trails that I could find. Using satellite view and hiking apps, I researched a way to hike that minimizes hiking along roads. This involved a combination of hiking cross country through woods and fields along with taking advantage of a zigzag of power line clearings.
The Fjelltoppjakten app showing my location and the (now earned) checkmark at Rubbestadfjell. The tower at Rubbestadfjell as seen from our apartment at Aurora Borealis Observatory.
There were a few things we had not anticipated.
For one, we encountered a wide range of animal tracks and scat. Given the few known species on the island and the shapes of the tracks and scat, they are from Red Fox, Eurasian Lynx, Moose, Reindeer and Hare. The only wildlife we actually encountered was a giant white hare sprinting through nature so fast we never got a photo.
We had fun experimenting with ways of avoiding breaking through the ice crust and sinking as far as our shins or even knees. One was to favor areas that spent more time in shadow, hence thicker crust.
I didn’t factor in how may creeks cross power line corridors in mountainous terrain. Each was an interesting puzzle to find a way across.
The terrain was incredibly steep in a few places, which would have been difficult to ascend even without being encased in ice crusted snow. We found an alternative way up nearby over lichen that was just as steep but less dangerous. One of the power lines we planned to use was too steep to even attempt, so we went entirely off trail. To our delight, we unexpectedly encountered a cross country ski trail that we used for a short way, and then an official UT (Norwegian Trekking) trail marked with the iconic red “T” seen across all of Norway. We more or less followed that the last kilometer to the summit. We needed our cramp on spikes for the remainder of the ascent. One section of the official “T” trail was too steep even with spikes. The ice crust was so solid, it was impossible to carve steps into the slope with our boots.
Being ravenously hungry after our adventurous 15 mile hike, we were eager to enjoy a delicious birthday dinner in the lodge. On our way to the lodge we were treated to another feast of auroras.
At 8:30, I decided to cap off my already magical birthday by venturing out to hunt for more auroras on the road leading further up the hill where the light pollution diminished even more.
This marked the end of a truly magical 62nd birthday – majestic fjords, northern lights, mega-adventure with Kai.
The remaining three days were no less stunning as we took a guided tour to the northern most fjords of Senja, a guided “aurora chase” on Friday, and a day in Tromsø on Saturday.
Powerful moments like this week remind me of how important it is to make time and mind space to experience and contemplate that which is greater than us, the mystical, spiritual and awe of our world and existence.
Here’s more photos and videos of the northern lights and the rest of the adventure.
Michael