NORWAY Dream
We unwittingly chose a very busy week to travel to Tromso, North of the Arctic Circle. It was school holidays for some European countries, the first international travel for many families, and in Norway the first time in 2years when all restrictions such as the 1m rule in public places were relaxed. And it was a week of Northern Light sightings.
We caught the train up from Oslo to Trondheim and picked up a 3 night cruise to Tromso.
This was traditionally the postal / delivery boat route ran by the Hurtigruten (‘sailing since 1893‘) and we’d been reliably informed that they perservere through the choppiest seas. The boat stopped every few hours but most of the stops were for deliveries and pick ups. We had a couple of hours at Bodo and made a b-line for a sushi place. Did we really have enough time for a nice lunch off ship ? As luck would have it, they had a eat as much as you want buffet, so no eating time was wasted on waiting for food. And we stuffed our faces and slip and slid-run back to the boat in time for set off.
Fjords, icebergs, islands, seafaring is a way of life in the Nordics. For us, they clearly knew what they were doing, it was a really comfortable cruise. It felt unusually cosy with rocking chairs and blankets in one section. And the staff were so friendly. In fact there was a box of knitting materials and people would knit squares and then these squares would be stitched together to create cosy blankets for the ship. And on outer deck it was crazy cold in the wind and bearable with gloves and hat in the sun.
We would run out to take photos of the incredible iceberg piercing crystal clear saturated luminous skies and then run back eyes and noses dripping with cold, to throw mishmash hand knitted blankets over our legs …. ahhhh that high.
So yes …. the skies and the sea reflecting the skies and the snow and ice shimmery and magical and spellbinding and envelope me with this crazy beautiful light.
But the real reason everyone was here… they wanted to catch the The Northern Lights. … Aurora Borealis.
“Aurora was the Roman goddess of dawn, and Borealis was the Greek name for the north wind”.
The absolute money shot of weather shots.
They can only really be seen in the dark, so from 1700 HRS. The other thing is that is best seen away from as much light pollution as possible, to allow our eyes to adjust and probably we would see it as a white streak with a tinge of green but our phone cameras night shot mode could pick up the light at the required wavelength. We even had the cabin internal radio on throughout the night in case of a sighting.
But we didn’t see it on our voyage. Don't get me wrong, we saw absolutely unbelievable skies and sunsets and icebergs and fjords. But by this time, was feeling a kind of next level fomo anxiety of not seeing the Northern Lights. Seriously what's wrong with me?
And what was all the fuss about ?
“A scientific phenomenon caused by electrically electrically charged particles from space (originating from the sun - solar winds) entering the Earth’s upper atmosphere at a very high speed. 98% of these particles are deflected by the Earth’s magnetic fields and the rest leak through and are funnelled towards the Earth’s magnetic North and South poles, colliding and exciting atoms and molecules. On decaying back to their original state, colours of light are emitted, Oxygen emits green and red (only visible sometimes) and Nitrogen emits purple”.
Or also explained by a scientist - Sophus Tromholt – a Danish astrophysicist who set up the auroral observatory in Kautokeino, Norway and also allegedly took the first first photograph of the Northern Lights in 1885 :
“From one side of the sky to another a drapery, woven of light and colour is wafted; now here now there, first one then two, then several bands, one above the other, never at rest, and never the same form, hither and thither the folds sway with a soft, fascinating motion, as from one end to the other waves of light chase each other, over-taking, crossing, meeting, while the lower, intense border, displays the loveliest colours of red and green, the upper one fading into the dark background”
Photocredit : University of Bergen Library.
Our final destination was Tromso, 400 km North of the Arctic Circle. It is one of the places were the sun sometimes never sets and sometimes (November to January - the Polar Night) doesn’t rise. It was termed in the nineteenth century as the Paris of the North, one commentator at the time, poet Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, who wrote the lyrics to the national anthem of Norway, said that it was all “..champagne and spectacle”. Certainly it had become the starting point for several Arctic expeditions and I can imagine was one of those exotic bragging rights destinations for curious Victorian era travellers. Even today it has more restaurants per head than any other Norweigan city and it is the largest fishing and transport hub in the Arctic North of Norway.
For us, it was kind of a quaint town with 70K inhabitants and bustling with tourists.
And we had booked possibly the most touristy thing we could -, a night at the Ice Hotel, walk in the forest with snow shoes, make fire, drink hot chocolate in the light of the moon, eat reindeer stew and sledge on reindeer the next day with an indigenous Sami local. And it was all bloody brilliant. Really it was absolutely spectacular … all of it. The first time you walk into the ice hotel, it is like nothing you have ever seen. Cavernous airy and again the light … the whole evening your eyes adjust to either bright moonlight or the weird spooky icy light. Makes you wonder so our eyes get used to this, how much light do we need ?
But heat we need heat .. I also confirmed when looking at our bed of ice. And I saw a wire with a switch next to it and I said to my husband reassuringly - oh they have some heated mattress setup I think. God I am silly… husband couldn’t stop laughing … the wire was actually for lights and yes we had signed up to sleeping on a block of ice, in a dome of ice with a hole into the night sky for ventilation. But we are zipped up in an arctic sleeping bag over reindeer hide (don’t even think about going to the toilet in the night !) and we did manage to get some sleep.
And best of all the Northern Lights cascaded in wisps across the skies like a celestial ghost throughout the evening while in the forest. I could understand why it had inspired so much folklore and legends about ravens to spirit guides. Especially if you had just been happenning to be trying to survive in these harsh conditions. Can you imagine your moustache and brows are crystalised with icicles with relatively monochrome backdrop probably no sun for months and you look up to see a coloured light show out of nowhere. Aliens (replace with Nordic god) I’m yours - you win.
The indigenous Sami culture called it “Guovssahas” - “the light you can hear.. thinking that the lights were caused by a magical fox running across the Arctic fells and sweeping it’s tail sending a trail of crackling sparks up in the sky”. And Norse mythology feature the Northern lights prominently …the lights were thought be reflections from the shields and armour of the Valkyrie, female warriors and also the bridge “Bifrost Bridge” which led those fallen in battle to the warriors final resting place in Valhalla.
It doesn’t matter who you are, it’s a universe size reminder to forget your own hype, feel suitably insignificant but monumentally lucky and connected to your own ancestors through an otherworldly sense of awe. You are feeling what they felt.
As a side note, here’s a project I worked previously https://www.bushraburge.com/#/ojenfryd/ on a Norse Legend about Aslaug - female empowerment story if ever was one. Incidentally Norway is considered to be one of the most gender equal countries in the world.