For ages we’ve had a shared dream to see the Northern Lights. In fact initially it wasn’t shared as such since we both had this desire long before we met. We’ve had a few fun but ultimately fruitless attempts in the past to see them, but now that we are able to head off traveling long term, a proper crack at finally seeing them seemed in order. When we’re finished, the dust has settled and we (hopefully) have lots of beautiful photos of spectacular northern lights, we’ll post more about how we planned the trip, what we budgeted, but for now here’s an update on our first week northern-light hunting.

We took the long way to northern Norway, flying in to Oslo, and taking an overnight train to Trondheim, changing there for a train to Bodo and finally a ferry to Moskenes in the Lofoten Islands. We were due to camp in Lofoten for 8 nights in the wild, above the arctic circle – not an easy task but we thought we were well prepared. We disembarked from the ferry and hauled our heavy bags for a kilometre and a bit before finding a perfect looking spot, close to fresh water, with a supply of wood, and set our first camp there.

David forgot to mention the Bodo ferry port, which as it turned out is open 24/7 and is nice and warm. Our train arrived in the afternoon and the ferry to Moskenes wasn’t until gone midnight, so it was great to have somewhere sheltered to wait. There are tables with chairs there, so we made some sandwiches for dinner there. We were there for good few hours and it wasn’t until right before the ferry arrival that we were joined by another person. I know the ferry was in the middle of the night, but considering there are only two ferries a day I was surprised by how few people boarded – only 5 including us!

Back to our camping, as David said we arrived late in Moskenes and set up camp. We both slept very well and despite my earlier worries I wasn’t cold at all, even despite the snow on the floor and low temperature. (For those of you interested I’ll make sure to list what I used to keep warm when I write about the equipment). We woke up late missing almost all the daylight that day. We had porridge and coffee for breakfast/lunch. We then decided to make a fire as it was quite chilly. The fire took some time to get going, but it was worth the effort as it was then very toasty to sit by. Later we had some couscous with chorizo and then when the fire died down we went for a short walk to the bridge over Djupfjorden and there… drumroll please… we saw our first glimpse of northern lights. They were faint and in the distance, but with the green and red hues they were unmistakably the northern lights!

Next day we woke up late again, but earlier than the previous day, and decided to explore Moskenes while it was still light. Once there we thought it would be nice to walk to Å. By the time we got there it was already dark, but that didn’t matter as the village looks charming at night. Many people already decorated their houses with all sorts of lights for Chrsitmas.

Yes that is Aleks by the sign for place actually called Å (pronounced more like “O” I think). Unfortunately both the stockfish museum and the fishing museum were closed, but it’s a quaint looking town. Two things of note about Å: it has rows upon rows of racks for drying cod, and it is the endpoint of the E10 road – so about as far south as you can drive into the Lofoten islands.

It was on our return from Å that things started to take a turn for the worse. Initially the high wind forced us into our tent after a hurried dinner. The wind was followed by rain and more rain. 13 hours in total it rained hard – I slept through maybe 3 of these. About 4 hours in, we noticed a puddle had formed on the hard ground underneath the tent. There was nothing we could do to stop this slowly leaking in to our tent, soaking a good deal of our stuff.

When the rain finally stopped the picture wasn’t good. With temperatures still at just above zero and everything sodden we failed to get a fire going in the short daylight hours. We knew that nothing would dry properly without this. As our delightful camping spot had now turned into something resembling a swamp we made the foolhardy decision to pack up camp and head north – initially walking to Reine, but on seeing how little opportunity there was to camp there, taking a bus up to Leknes.

I don’t think I ever appreciated a bus as much as I did that one to Leknes. It was dry, the heating was on full (my hair managed to dry during the one hour journey) and the driver played Christmas songs. Oh, the weather outside is frightful, But the fire is so delightful… or in this case the bus heating is so delightful. Anyway, the bus journey ended too quickly and out we were in the wind and the sleet.

Leknes turned out to be a disappointment. During our bus journey a quick google search revealed that there’s only one, rather overpriced hotel. We therefore attempted to look for a spot to wild camp, without much luck as everywhere seemed waterlogged. We then made a decision to walk to the airport and see if there were any flights out to Tromso and if not then maybe try to stay a night there. What we didn’t realise was that Leknes airport is tiny, operates flights almost exclusively to Bodø and closes overnight. The rather unimpressed Airport employee told us we can come back at 5am and when asked if he knew were we could camp in Leknes, he pointed to the field adjacent to the airport. I’m not sure he understood what we were asking, but we ended up camping on that field anyway. 150 meter into that field, or there about. It was another windy night, but luckily it didn’t rain (not that that mattered much as most of our stuff was already damp anyway). I can confirm that synthetic fibre sleeping bags do remain warm even when damp – thank goodness.

Having camped out just 4 of our 8 nights planned we decided that the position we were in wasn’t great. A weather forecast on the airport wifi confirmed our gloom with more rain, sleet and cloud for the next week. Miserable days with wet kit and no northern lights beckoned. So we decided to change plans a bit and get up early in the morning to catch a bus to Tromso. We had planned to be there from the Saturday, so all that needed doing was a change to the start date on our car rental, and a booking for the cheapest hotel room we could find.

The bus journey at least gave us a chance to see some of the beauty of Lofoten that we had missed with our survival camping and rainy night walking. Hopefully we can return under better circumstances some time. The journey also taught us one more thing: if ever passing through Bjerkvik (where we changed buses) one should make sure to visit Lille Kjoken. It may look like a greasy burger place, but the meal we had (some sort of Christmas special with fatty pork cutlets and potatoes) was unbelievable. A good choice for our only prepared food of the trip so far.

Tromso is a beautiful city as our night walk can attest and we are excited now to start the next phase of our trip tomorrow – after of course enjoying our only nights sleep in a real bed for some time