I chased the Northern Lights around the Arctic — it didn’t go to plan

Fingertips burning, I can barely hold my phone steady as Arctic wind whips daggers across my cheeks. My thermal vest has dislodged from the waistband of my trousers, exposing naked skin to the biting polar breeze. My nose is running, my toes are aching, and my neck has seized from gazing upwards into the blackness of the night sky.

And then, from the abyss, it appears: a white wisp swirling like script from a calligraphy pen. It twists and twirls in hypnotic dance, stretching this way and that until it spans the snowcapped horizon, bursting forth like a cosmic ballerina pirouetting across the stars.

There’s no time to wait. Amid the howl of huskies, we bundle into the van, our driver Mili expertly navigating the icy roads until we reach a desolate stretch overlooking a fjord. And there, in the subzero darkness of northern Norway, we are humbled by a solar substorm that has created a breathtaking display of the Northern Lights.

Tears spill down my face as we witness an ethereal kaleidoscope of green and pink billowing out below the moon. I know that it’s not, but it’s the closest thing to magic I’ve ever seen. As a polar princess once said, the cold never bothered me anyway.

I was in Kirkenes, a remote mining town ten minutes drive from the Russian border that was once occupied by Nazi Germany. I had been invited to chase the elusive aurora borealis on a cruise with Hurtigruten, and this was the final stop of the MS Nordkapp’s voyage from Trondheim to the Arctic Circle.

It had been anything but smooth sailing. Our expedition was thrown into chaos from the moment we landed in Oslo, where a storm of 65mph winds cancelled our connecting flight and the first two days of planned excursions. Matters did not improve once we detoured to the ship. A powerful swell carried us along much of Norway’s west coast, with eight-metre waves churning like a washing machine. Bottles smashed; port stops were skipped; people vomited on their dinner plates.

We retreated to our cabins. ‘Keep one hand on the ship!’ came the announcement over the tannoy as the contents of my bathroom shelf crashed to the floor. Clinging to the bed like a koala, I willed away the nausea and stared through the porthole; an ominous slate sky offered little hope of even a fleeting glimpse of the Northern Lights. My first trip on a cruise ship was not going to plan.

It will come as a surprise, then, that this misfortune-plagued journey turned out to be one of the best experiences of my life. And even if we hadn’t been treated to a truly spectacular aurora on the final night, I think I would say the same. Hurtigruten is a cruise with a difference. Unlike traditional liners, it started life in 1893 as a post and cargo ferry carrying people between remote fishing villages.

Today, passengers are split between international tourists on 12-day packages and locals going about their daily business. You’re just as likely to see a German couple trying reindeer at Nordkapp’s fine dining restaurant as you are a businessman in a Helly Hansen windbreaker, sitting at the bar on his commute between Ornes and Tromso.

The staff are delightful and seem genuinely passionate about showing you the best of Norway. They’re charming, and not in a saccharine ‘have a nice day’ way. Most come from towns dotted along the coast, and many are from families who have worked on Hurtigruten ships for generations.

The food is exquisite and quintessentially Nordic, from Arctic char at the main restaurant, Torget, to brown cheese ice cream at Multe bakery (don’t knock it until you’ve tried it). Since 2015, the ship has also treated guests to Nidelven Bla, a strong Scandinavian blue repeatedly voted the world’s best cheese.

But the crowning glory of Hurtigruten’s culinary offering is Havets Bobler, the world’s first Arctic-aged sparkling wine matured in the depths of a fjord off the north Norwegian coast. The location is kept under lock and key; after fruitless probing, I sat back and enjoyed the fizz.

The past year has seen a surge of interest in the Northern Lights, driven by a solar maximum that has caused the most frequent and impressive displays in more than a decade. These cycles take roughly 11 years, which means the best chance of seeing aurora is in the next 12 months — after that, you’ll be waiting until 2036.

This is, of course, huge news for the ‘noctourism’ industry and experts like astronomer Tom Kerss, Hurtigruten’s ‘chief aurora chaser’ who accompanies us on our voyage. I ask Tom what he thinks is driving interest in the Northern Lights, aside from the bumper sightings the UK and much of Europe were treated to in May and October.

‘I think it’s been a perfect storm,’ he says. ‘The solar maximum definitely piqued people’s interest last year, but I think you’ve also still got that post-Covid afterglow of people looking for experiential travel, combined with Norway as a destination just being really huge right now.’.

There’s that, for certain. Norwegian Air launched direct flights between London Gatwick and Harstad-Narvik Airport in Evenes in the Arctic Circle just in time for the peak winter season last year. Lofoten, a stunning chain of islands that offers the Northern Lights in the winter and midnight sun in summer, saw a 15% uptick in visitors from 2022 to 2023.