This latest adventure was more ethereal than we have ever had.  You see Jonathan and I have always wanted to see the northern lights.  I even woke up my campers 2 different times at 3 am to go outside and try to see them.  Unfortunately both times we were unsuccessful.  Jonathan originally picked Iceland for his graduation trip, but his dad quickly vetoed that so instead he opted for an Alaskan Cruise, again in hopes of seeing the northern lights.  Then Covid19 happened and changed the cruising industry for a long time.

First they shut down altogether, then they only allowed vaccinated travelers, then they changed their Alaskan route to avoid Canada, now it is open to all travelers, but the routes are still different.  While we were up at Birch Bay, WA, which is the edge of Washington and Canada, Jonathan’s girlfriend pointed out that the northern lights were supposed to be visible.  So we immediately went to plan where and what time would be the best.

So we headed off to the semiahmoo spit and camped out on the beach, trying to get away from the city lights.  It was about 11:30 pm before we started to really see anything.  We showed up at 10 pm along with many other hopeful watchers.  It was absolutely amazing to see the sky slowly light up then completely change when we started taking pictures.

We had no idea that our cameras would do a better job than our own eyes.  Once we slowed down the exposure and opened the lens more, it was absolutely awe inspiring!  It was crazy to think that something so far away on the sun, caused the electromagnetic storm on Earth that allowed so many places on Earth to see the beauty of the northern lights.

Any chance you get to see them, I would make sure you stay up late, go outside even if it’s cold, and definitely turn your flash off, use your digital camera, if you have a night mode turn it on, and get comfortable.  It is well worth it.  

Consequently, we still have not been able to take that cruise and so I asked Jonathan if he would still want to go to Alaska since he has now seen the northern lights.  He said yes, totally worth seeing it again as well as he is like his mama so anything outside generally appeals to him.

Until the next adventure….