I don’t think this could be any more Svalbard – aurora, polar bear sign, snow, mountains, snowmobiles…
It was an absolutely clear – and slightly chilly – night. It was close to 1:00am. Checking the three aurora apps I had, there seemed little that was encouraging to go outside. A 9% chance of auroras in Longyearbyen vs a nice warm bed…
But it was a clear night and I love taking night photos, so on went ALL of the layers and out in to the fresh night I went.
I had been out there for quite a while and decided I would take ‘just one more’. Looking at the back of my camera… was that a tiny smudge of red in the left hand corner…? Maybe it was a brake light…? Another snap showed slightly more of a smudge. Could it be??
To think I was two minutes from heading back inside…
I was out in the arctic night for hours as the northern lights danced and swirled above my head. They were low on the horizon, then right overhead, faint and fading, then blazing and swirling. They were green and red – then there was a flash of yellow. They were stunning. I was completely and utterly overawed by nature and her beauty.
It was late and the rest of Nybyen seemed to be sound asleep – my only company was a beautiful arctic fox who trotted across about 20 metres in front of me. She stopped and looked at me looking at her. I admired her beauty, I think she wondered what on earth was this strange creature doing standing out in the snow, talking to the sky…
Shout out to @fi_sproles the absolute star who sent a text from the other side of the world saying something like ‘if you’re not outside looking up into the sky, get out there - it’s going off!!!’ when it was indeed all going off!!! [yes, I was outside…] I’m sure the original message was much more polite, but I think I have accurately conveyed the sentiment.