The Arctic North
Trip dates: January 18, 2017 - January 21, 2017
We left London and headed further north to Norway in the hopes of catching the northern lights. We flew on Norwegian Airlines, which was named the top European budget airline on something or other; we were on a newer Boeing 737 so it was pretty nice, and reasonably spacious, especially compared to Asia’s budget airlines!
After connecting through Oslo, we arrived in our destination of Tromsø, which is near the northernmost part of Norway on the main peninsula.
The roads were snowy and a bit icy when we landed, but no worries, they have an intricate network of tunnels to make driving around fast and easy. There’s even traffic circles in the tunnels, crazy! After checking in to our hotel, and bundling up some more, we took a quick stroll around town. Tromsø city center is fairly small.
We stayed three nights in Tromsø, and were planning to do northern light chases for two of the nights. Unfortunately, the first night that we were supposed to go, our tour was cancelled due to the weather. It was very windy, snowing with sleet, and the road conditions weren’t great. So we ended up just hanging out all day, mostly indoors :) We also discovered that daylight in Tromsø is still very limited at this time of year; we had just missed the polar nights by a week or so but there was still only a couple hours of sunlight and that still doesn’t mean that you can actually see the sun since we were so far north. In fact, the day that we flew out was Sun Day, which is officially the first day that the sun could viably be seen in Tromsø. The locals celebrate this day with sun cakes, which we got to try at the airport, as these are available everywhere throughout the town in celebration.
Our second day in Tromsø didn’t look to be any better, as it was still pretty windy and snowy, but we had a day tour planned that was still on - Arctic Landscapes. We were in a small group (just 6 of us + a guide) and ended up going all around Kvaløya, which is the next island over from Tromsø and connected by a bridge. Kvaløya means Whale Island in Norwegian and, in the past 5 years or so, there have been up to hundreds of whales seen in its many fjords. Sidenote, it’s kind of a bummer that whale watching has become such a huge tourist attraction as a result because there aren’t regulations here, so the boats get super close to the whales and end up chasing them around :(
We were lucky enough to see several orcas in the various fjords we stopped at from the shore; I even saw my first humpback whale! Seeing their flukes as they dove was absolutely amazing! I could have stayed there all day watching them. (Eric note: Lishan was so excited after seeing the humpback's tail - fluke - it sounded like she won the lotto, she was cheering and prancing!)
We made our way around the island, stopping at fjords, beaches, fishing villages, and eventually going to a mountain pass where the winds were absolutely ridiculous. There were times (at the beach, on the mountain, pretty much everywhere) where the winds were so strong that you could get knocked a little off balance! A guide later mentioned they were hurricane strength winds. Because the winds moved so fast though, we were treated to rapid weather changes from snowing and bleak to clear skies with beautiful pink colors. The wind and all the colors don’t come through as well in the photos, but trust me, it was beautiful. The landscape was so vast and majestic, it really makes you appreciate how small we are in the grand scheme of things. Despite being so windy and bitterly cold, this place was so beautiful and enchanting, I can’t wait to go back!
Photo gallery (sorry there's a ton of pictures!) is in chronological order, so you can see how the skies above us were constantly changing throughout our day.
Here are some videos to help show just how windy it was.
After touring the arctic landscape, we were headed back to Tromsø where Eric and I would then be joining a northern lights tour in the evening. We thought we’d have an hour or two in between to warm up, maybe take a nap, but we ran into a hiccup on the drive back to Tromsø. The roads were fairly narrow and a bus was coming in the opposite direction, so our guide drove towards the side. Well, we were going around a curve and with all the snow, you couldn’t really see where the road dropped off and so we ended up going reallllly slowly into a ditch. It wasn’t scary or dangerous in any way, but we were stuck and couldn’t get out ourselves. The company ended up sending two other cars, one to help pull the minivan out of the ditch, and another to get those of us with evening appointments (someone was flying out that night!) back to Tromsø quickly. Never a dull moment :)
pano at the mountain pass
We managed to get back to Tromsø relatively quickly so we had time to stop back off at the hotel and put on an additional layer before heading back out. The snow and wind had picked up in certain areas and so we were literally chasing northern lights, driving around looking for clear patches of sky. The evening tour started out a bit of a drag, as we drove around for two hours just to end up back at Tromsø due to the rapidly changing weather and white-out conditions where we were originally going. Our patience eventually paid off though. We made our way from Tromsø to Kvaløya and then on to the next island, Ringvassøya, where we eventually found a remote area with some clear skies.
At first, we couldn’t really see much except with a camera. But then, after 5mins or so, we could noticeably see white streaks with our naked eye, which were green streaks on the camera. Not having seen much else, Eric and I were excited to finally see the northern lights but also a bit underwhelmed. After another 10mins or so, the clouds started moving back in so we all slowly made our way back to the bus. As we did so, the sky started clearing up again and all of a sudden, we could see green above us. Next thing we knew, we got quite a show as we laid on our backs and watched the lights dance and shift across the sky. Our guide informed us that what we were witnessing was the corona, which is somewhat infrequent and can be seen roughly once a month.
We didn’t capture much of this on the camera as we were just enjoying the show, but it was mesmerizing. The sky seemed alive as the lights shifted and got brighter and took on various shapes. And then, just as quickly as it started, the clouds rolled back in and our show was over.
Even though our northern lights show was pretty short (maybe only 30mins in total for a tour from 6pm to 2am), those few minutes of seeing the corona made the trip totally worth it! The evening, like during the day, was really windy and cold. Our tour included thermal suits but the guides didn’t really offer them so I was the only one that got one (thanks to Eric asking for me) and it made a huge difference! I would have been pretty miserable if I didn’t have the thermal suit, and didn’t get to see the corona. I don’t know why no one else got a suit, dodos.
Anyways, if you end up going to Tromsø and are looking for a northern lights tour group, we highly recommend the Wandering Owl. We really enjoyed both of the tours that we did with them, although the northern lights one was a little bit larger than we would have liked (15 people). Both of our guides were very knowledgeable and enthusiastic, which really helped make the experience a fun one despite your extremities being numb half the time.
With some reluctance, we left Tromsø to head to Copenhagen. But oh wait, our incoming plane was delayed so we actually ended up spending most of our day in Norway sitting in the airport at Tromsø and then Oslo. Not the most enjoyable, especially since we didn’t have lounge access in Tromsø or Oslo, but there could be worse airports to have to pass the time in. At least we had pretty views!
In summary, Norway is cold and expensive but beautiful to boot, and I would highly recommend visiting. I’m looking forward to the next trip there and exploring other parts of the region - I’m looking at you Svalbard!
