Category Archives: Travel

The Danube Waltz Redemption

Prague: The Warm-Up Act That Steals the Show

We arrived four days early. The same logic as before: jet lag is brutal, and planes are sometimes unreliable. My pre-failure here was in not securing business class seats – but we managed. This time we stayed in Prague rather than London, which turned out to be the right call. Prague is spectacular, and unlike London it doesn’t charge you £400 for the privilege of being rained on.

The Old Town Square alone is worth the airfare. The medieval Astronomical Clock – the Orloj – performs a brief mechanical procession of apostles every hour. The audience of tourists pointing phones at it would confuse the 15th-century clockmaker, but I think he’d be pleased the thing still runs.

We walked the Charles Bridge in the day, and again at night. It’s lined with 30 Baroque statues of saints, each one dramatic enough to star in its own cathedral. The bridge is pedestrian-only, and the imposing Prague Castle lit up on the hill, reflected in the Vltava below – is exactly as good as every photo you’ve ever seen of it. Possibly better.

At left: Old Town Square at night. The Astronomical Clock tower (left) and the Church of Our Lady before Týn (right). The clock has been running since 1410 – before Columbus sailed, before the printing press, before anyone thought to call it “Central Europe.”

*Long exposure of the Charles Bridge from downstream using the telephoto (5x zoom). The reflections give you two photos for the price of one.*

*Kafka’s Head” – stainless steel sculpture by David Černý*

“Kafka’s Head” is a 45-layer rotating stainless steel sculpture by David Černý near the Palladium shopping center. The layers spin independently and periodically align into a recognizable face. Franz Kafka was born a few blocks away, which seems appropriate for a man who spent his career writing about fragmented, bewildering identities. What do I mean? Well Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis (1915) follows traveling salesman Gregor Samsa, who wakes up transformed into a giant cockroach. Yeah, that Kafka.

Street view from the *Art Noveau Palace Hotel, Prague*

Breakfast in the dining area of the Art Nouveau Palace Hotel, Prague, looking down a typical street through an arched window. Prague is full of interiors like this: elegant, unhurried, and considerably cheaper than the equivalent in Vienna or Paris. And it was just blocks away that we found Svíčková. But you’ll have to wait for that.

*Prague’s terracotta roofline from the grounds of the Prague Castle complex.*

The city looks much as it has for centuries, which is either extraordinary preservation or a shortage of developers with ambition. You can see that ambition is not lost on the newer parts of Prague – check out those MANY cranes in the distance!

A practical note: Prague is extremely walkable if you are willing to do a lot of walking. The food is excellent and cheap by Western European standards, and the transit system is clean and reliable – or so we observed. We arrived late on the first day, and the three days remaining felt short. If you can swing four, do it. Word of caution: beware any ATM machine that say “EuroNet”. They are well documented tourist traps with hideous exchange rates. And by the way, that is the least best thing about Prague. The Czech Republic (and Hungary) use their own currency. In the republic currency is called the koruna, or crown (code: CZK) not the Euro. In fact, Hungary (with its forint’s) was the only place where we had to switch phone plans to stay connected. The good news is that credit cards are accepted just about everywhere.

Prague Walking Track — March 2026

Prague Airport and Walking Track – March 2026

GPS track recorded during pre-cruise exploration

Passau: A Lovely City With a Dark Footnote

From Prague we traveled by coach to Passau, Germany – our ship departure point. Passau is a small, photogenic city at the confluence of three rivers (the Danube, the Inn, and the Ilz), which gives it a layered, peninsular quality. It also floods constantly, which the locals have documented on their buildings with remarkable precision.

Our Passau guide, Esther, was originally from Singapore, married a German, and earned her citizenship – giving her an outsider-insider perspective on the city that was worth any organized tour. She walked us through the city pointing out trams and buses, oddly named streets and flood marks. She explained German bureaucracy with the rueful humor of a survivor, and then told us about a four-year-old boy who once fell through the thin ice on the Inn River and was pulled out by a local priest who later became the St. Stephen’s cathedral organist.

“That boy,” she said, pausing for effect, “was Adolf Hitler.”

<- Our guide, Esther, pointing out the high-water marks embedded in the wall. Each plaque records a different flood year. The marks go considerably above head height. The uppermost plaque, recording the highest flood reads: After the birth of Christ, in the year 1501, on Our Lady’s Day, the floodwaters rose to the cross. Passau has been doing this for a very long time. The street name: Roßtränke means “Horse Trough”

*St. Stephen’s Cathedral, Passau. Home to the largest pipe organ north of the Alps (17,974 pipes). We did not hear it play.*

Passau also had opinions about geopolitics. Several shop windows in the Old Town displayed signs reading “Putin’s Supporters: No Entry.” Central Europe’s proximity to Ukraine makes the war feel considerably less abstract there than it might from, say, Seattle.

It’s worth noting, too, that many of the towns and countries we visited along the Danube have taken in enormous numbers of Ukrainian refugees. We spoke with Ukrainians everywhere – some tending shops, some cleaning them, some in heavy industry, many aboard ship. The most Ukrainians taken in per capita were in Estonia, Czechia (aka the Czech Republic), Slovakia – and Ireland. Bravo to those countries for their hospitality. Poland received more but they are much larger country – and, of course – a neighbor to the Ukraine.

It was palpable to us, as American’s abroad, in that the war with Iran was started on February 28th, was still ongoing during our sojourn abroad – and is still ongoing today in June as I write this.

Aboard the Viking Vilhjalm: The Flat-Water Difference

The Viking Vilhjalm is a river longship measuring 443 feet long, 38 feet wide, and hauling 190 passengers. The Viking Vela carried 998. The most immediate practical difference: nothing rocks or rolls. The river is glassy, the ship is flat, and at no point did anyone measure the tilt with a bubble level app. This was, I cannot overstate, a significant improvement.

The Vilhjalm from the Chain bridge over the Danube. The dining room glows through the panoramic windows – a reminder that one of the pleasures of river cruising is dining while watching the city drift past.

The Viking Vilhjalm docked in Budapest as the blue hour settles in. The Buda skyline – Fisherman’s Bastion, Matthias Church – lit up behind it. This is what “docked in the heart of the city” looks like.

River cruises also pass under bridges and through locks with impressive frequency and minimal clearance. The wheelhouse folds flat hydraulically, which you can watch from the sun deck (if allowed, that is, some under-crossings are less spacious than others). The captain threads the ship under railway bridges at night without drama. On our previous cruise, “drama” was essentially the entire experience. The contrast was noted and appreciated.

*Night passage. The wheelhouse is partially retracted to clear the bridge. The margin looks alarming; apparently it is not.*

The smaller passenger count means the crew learns names, preferences, and jokes. Which brings us to the Hannah Waddington situation.

Rebecca from Ted Lasso, Apparently on a Career Break

One of the dining crew was the spitting image of Hannah Waddington – the 6-foot-tall British actress who plays club owner Rebecca Welton in Ted Lasso. tricia, who cannot let a good resemblance go unnoted, asked her if anyone had ever said she looks like the star.

She paused. “That’s the first time this year!”

Then: “…and this is the first cruise of the year.”

The delivery was impeccable. She had a wickedly good sense of humor and warm presence to match, and by the second day we – along with a growing number of other passengers – were specifically seeking out her section. If you sail on the Vilhjalm and a tall, very funny woman who looks uncannily like Hannah Waddington is working the dining room: request her table. Don’t call her Hannah, though, her name is Anett, and she’s from Latvia. You’re welcome.

Linz and Pöstlingberg: A Frankfurter Worth the Climb

Linz is Austria’s third-largest city and the one most likely to surprise you. It sits at the foot of a vine-covered hill called Pöstlingberg – which roughly translated means “the postal area mountain”. You can reach its heights by a historic tram that begins downtown and claims to be one of the steepest adhesion railways in the world. At the top of the Pöstlingbergbahn you will find a Grottenbahn – which is a whimsical “grotto railway” for children. It wasn’t running, we missed that train. The tram left from this very square.

Linz’s Hauptplatz (main square) with the famous “LINZ” letter sculpture framing the Plague Column. Yes, “Plague Column”. That’s a bit of history North Americans did not have to endure, and many cities have monuments erected commemorating the end of the Black Death. Linz has worked hard to rebrand itself as a cultural city – it is the birthplace of Anton Bruckner a bizarre man and brilliant composer, and home to the Ars Electronica festival. Also, regrettably, the hometown of Hitler. A city dealing with a complicated legacy.

At the top of Pöstlingberg, the Schloss Bräu restaurant has a deck with a panoramic view of Linz spread far below in the Danube valley. We had the Frankfurters. Two of them each, served in a delicious crunchy pretzel-like bun with shredded fresh horseradish. It sounds humble. It was not humble. It was the second-best thing I ate on the entire trip, and I ate some genuinely excellent things on this trip.

Pöstlingberg, looking back down over the rooftops to Linz in the valley and the Danube beyond. The Schloss Bräu restaurant is to the right of this picture, but has a view much like that large terrace you see at the right. The Frankfurters are not visible but trust me

Göttweig Abbey: Apricot Dumplings and Baroque Excess

Between Linz and Krems is Göttweig Abbey (Stift Göttweig) which is a Benedictine monastery perched on a hill above the Wachau Valley that has been operating since 1083. The docking is in Krems – so you’ve already had chance to catch a glimpse of Göttweig high up on a hill before a bus takes you there. The current Baroque buildings date to the 18th century and are, in the way of 18th-century ecclesiastical architecture, considerably larger than necessary.

Stift Göttweig. The foundation stone was laid in 1083; the current complex was rebuilt in Baroque style after a fire in 1718. The abbey produces its own wine, olive oil, and apricot products from the surrounding orchards.

The Wachau Valley is Austria’s most celebrated wine and apricot-growing region, and Göttweig’s café served apricot dumplings (Marillenknödel) – soft potato dough wrapped around a whole apricot with its pit removed and replaced by a sugar cube, rolled in buttered breadcrumbs. You have not had apricot dumplings until you have had apricot dumplings at a Benedictine monastery overlooking a UNESCO World Heritage valley. I’m setting the bar deliberately high.

The Wachau Valley: Castles Included, No Extra Charge

The stretch of Danube between Linz and Krems is the Wachau. And it is a UNESCO World Heritage landscape of vineyards, medieval villages, and castle ruins perched on cliffs. It is the kind of scenery that makes the cruise fare feel justified regardless of everything else.

*Schönbühel Castle, which has watched the Danube since the 12th century. The current structure dates to 1821. It still looks appropriately medieval from the water.*

The town of Dürnstein is where Richard the Lionheart was imprisoned in 1192. His loyal minstrel Blondel supposedly wandered Europe singing outside castle walls until Richard sang back – one of history’s more musical jailbreaks. The ruins are still on the cliff above town, and the blue Baroque church tower below makes the village look like a painting someone left out in good weather.

*Dürnstein. The blue church tower belongs to the Augustinian monastery. Richard the Lionheart’s castle ruins are on the cliff above. He did not leave a review.*

Sailing through the Wachau on a clear March morning. The Austrian flag indicates we’ve crossed from Germany. The valley looks exactly like a UNESCO site should.

Vienna: More Than a Day Could Justify

Vienna got one full day, which was not enough. It is enormous, beautiful, and packed with imperial grandeur at a density that becomes mildly numbing – the opera house, the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the parliament, the Burgtheater, Stephansdom, all within walking distance, all built to impress, all succeeding.

The Kunsthistorisches Museum on Maria-Theresien-Platz, facing its twin the Natural History Museum across the square. Both were built in the 1890s and both contain more than you can see in an afternoon.

*Stephansdom (St. Stephen’s Cathedral) in the heart of Vienna. The spire is 448 feet tall.*

The outdoor café in the foreground seems unbothered by the huge spire and features something worth stopping for: Kaiserschmarrn – which is literally translated “Emperor’s Mess” – it’s a delicious pancake thingy. If there is no table space, you can find a take out window with a quick moving line.

It seems every city we stopped in had it’s own composer of record. I couldn’t keep them straight. When I blurted out “Richard Strauss” trying to answer our Vienna tour guide query: the guide’s stern eye and swift correction “Johann Strauss” made me realize I made an embarrassing faux pas. Johann is from Vienna, Richard is from Berlin. It felt for a moment like I had put ketchup on a hot dog in Chicago.

Come back for three days minimum. Consider bringing a museum membership.

Bratislava: The Underrated One

Bratislava in Slovakia gets less attention than Prague, Vienna, and Budapest, which is undeserved. The old town is compact, walkable, and genuinely lovely. The Primate’s Palace, where Napoleon and Austrian Emperor Francis II signed the Peace of Pressburg in 1805, is among the finest Neoclassical buildings in Central Europe, and the compact scale of the city means you’re never far from something worth seeing.

*The Primate’s Palace, Bratislava. Napoleon signed a treaty here. It now houses the mayor’s office, which seems like a reasonable use of a landmark.*

Bridge of the Slovak National Uprising, also known as the **UFO Bridge**, located in **Bratislava, Slovakia**

Speaking of landmarks, the most unusual bridge we passed beneath was the “UFO Bridge” in Bratislava, Slovakia. It is odd in that it is a cable-stayed bridge that has a single pylon with a “saucer shaped restaurant” at the top. We had the time to give it a try, but decided to remain on our side of the Danube and enjoy the view instead.

The bridge was built in late 1960s and early ’70s at the height of Communist excess, in honor of the 1944 resistance movement against the Nazi forces. It’s probably the ONLY communist era structure with pizazz. Throughout the Slavic countries, astute guides will point out how to easily distinguish Soviet era buildings from any others: the Soviet Era buildings are the ugly ones, i.e. gray, square, and unembellished.

What NOT To Do if You Are A Linguist

Now might be a good time to point out what not to do when in any former Slavic country. Language is my thing. I am weird that way. I’m fairly fluent in German so Passau (Germany) to Vienna (Austria) was easy. But Czech’s of course speak Czech, while Slovakians, Slovenians, and Croats all speak their own dialects – but each mostly understands the other. The mistake NOT to make is noting aloud how each “Good Morning” greeting sounds like Russian which is pronounced “DOBRaye OOTra”. I made that mistake several times (I’m a slow learner) as I tried to pronounce local “Good Day” and “Thank You” variations. All those countries were once under the thumb of the Soviet Union, of which they do not like to be reminded. Everyone I spoke to – including the Hungarians – agreed that Hungarian is the most impossible language ever. This is especially amusing to me now, because one of my photos appeared in the Hungarian edition of “The Economist” and that partially explains the bizarre way they spelled my name in the credits. A Hungarian article about when I won the Astronomy Photographer of the Year contest came with a similar, unrecognizable, transmogrification of my name.

While I’m on the subject, here are a few notes for us Westerners. What German speakers call Donau (Duh-NOW) we call the Danube. What westerners call “Prague” the Czechs – who live there – call Praha, Wien (pronounced VEEN), is the actual name of Vienna. If it seems almost everything Czech (Č) ends with a “ch” or an “itch” … well, that’s because almost everything does. To their credit, they bother to show how to accent things. English is a quagmire.

Budapest: The Grand Finale

Budapest may be the most photogenic city in Europe. I say this having just come from Prague, Vienna, and Bratislava, all of which are lovely. Budapest operates at a different scale of dramatic. The Danube cuts the city in two – Buda on the west with its castle and Baroque churches on the hill, Pest on the east with the Parliament and the grand avenues – and both sides light up at night in a way that makes the river between them glow.

*The Hungarian Parliament building from the Buda side by day. 879 feet long, 96 domes, 691 rooms, built between 1885 and 1904. Still the largest building in Hungary.*

*The Parliament lit gold at night. The daytime photograph is impressive; the night photograph is something else.*

*One of the four lions guarding the Chain Bridge, with Buda Castle lit above. The lions were installed in 1852 and have been criticized ever since for lacking tongues. They remain silent on the matter.*

*60 pairs of iron shoes, installed in 2005 to commemorate the Jews shot here.*

Budapest also contains one of the most affecting memorials I have seen anywhere. That’s saying a lot. My wife and I both stood along the long black marble Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall in Washington, DC and we wept as we watched a legless wheelchair-bound vet rub his hand slowly and somberly over the name of a fallen colleague.

Along the Pest bank of the Danube, 60 pairs of iron shoes mark the spot where Hungarian Jews were shot by the Arrow Cross militia and fell into the river during the winter of 1944–45. The shoes represent different people: men’s shoes, women’s shoes, a child’s. There is no plaque required to understand what you’re looking at.

In fact, I didn’t notice when I took the photo, but someone has placed Ukrainian flag ribbons on a pair of women’s shoes – a quiet statement about history’s tendency to repeat.

*Breakfast aboard the Vilhjalm, docked in Budapest. Matthias Church and Fisherman’s Bastion through the window. The coffee was also good* – per my wife. I mostly drank peppermint tea.

One of the pleasures of river cruising is waking up docked in the heart of a city. Breakfast with Matthias Church visible through the dining room window is a specific luxury that anchors-and-tender ocean cruising can seldom match.

The Food: An Itinerary Within the Itinerary

*Svíčková na smetaně: braised beef in creamy root vegetable sauce, with cranberries, lemon zest, cream, and bread dumplings on the side. The Czech dark beer appears to have been involved as well.*

A Danube cruise feeds you well on both sides of the gangway. The single best dish of the trip was Svíčková na smetaně – a classic Czech preparation of braised beef sirloin in a rich, creamy root vegetable sauce, served with bread dumplings (knedlíky), cranberry sauce, and lemon zest. We learned about it from our driver from the Prague airport, who had grown up in Czechoslovakia during the communist era and steered us toward it with the conviction of someone passing on essential knowledge. He was right. If you are in Prague and you skip the Svíčková (SVEETCH KO VAH) in favor of something you already know, you will regret it. The same driver said something that really stuck with me:

“The Czechs and the Slovaks split the country, and only the politicians remember why.” The Velvet Divorce as it is called happened in 1992. Each country is less populous than the city of Los Angeles.

The second-best dish – which was mentioned earlier and surprised me – was a humble Frankfurter at Schloss Bräu in Pöstlingberg, above Linz: served in a crunchy pretzel bun with shredded fresh horseradish. Simple ingredients, flawless execution, and a view of the Danube valley as a bonus.

Göttweig Abbey’s apricot dumplings have already been covered in the relevant section but deserve a second mention here because they were awesome – not to mention the fact that the ship’s chef prepared a cooking demonstration about how to make them. The chef had very strong opinions about why the way he and the Viennese made schnitzel was superior. “It seems foolish to me to get a delicious crispy finished dish and then place it in or cover it with a sauce that makes it soggy.” He was very right!

Some of the local flare was less impressive, of course. One of the worst mistakes we made, food wise, was attempting to get Vietnamese food in Prague (What WERE we thinking!?) In our defense, Slavic food is much like German food. Heavy on the sauces and shades of brown, butter and meat – so the Vietnamese fiasco was an attempt to get healthier, lighter fare. It was reminiscent of traveling in Spain where it seemed nothing green was going to ever appear on a plate and we pleaded with the hotel for a plate of broccoli. In Slovenia, green appeared on the plate, but parsley just doesn’t count as a vegetable, does it?

*Slovenian sausage with sauerkraut and sides in Ljubljana, complete with a Slovenian flag toothpick. Local restaurants in Ljubljana take the flag – and the sausage very seriously.* We were less of a fan.

*Breakfast aboard the Vilhjalm. The kitchen arranged the Eggs Benedict, sausages, and bacon into a smiley face (Of course it was Anett’s doing*)*. The food was consistently excellent, but this particular presentation was memorable.*

The Viking ship’s own kitchen was consistently good. Genuinely good. Not “good for a boat.” The Eggs Benedict arranged into a smiley face one morning was a small detail that suggested the kitchen was paying attention and having fun. But everything was consistently good to excellent.

Zagreb and Ljubljana: The Bonus Round

The post-cruise days took us first to Zagreb for two days, and then to Ljubljana for two more. Both of which exceeded expectations.

Zagreb has the confident ease of a city that knows its own value without needing to advertise it. The Croatian National Theatre – canary yellow, impeccably maintained since Emperor Franz Joseph inaugurated it in 1895 – anchors the lower city. The upper town is medieval, quiet, and connected by a funicular that is so short it feels more like an elevator with ambitions.

The Croatian National Theatre, Zagreb. Emperor Franz Joseph I inaugurated it in 1895. The flowers in the foreground are a reminder that spring arrives in the Balkans before it arrives in, say, Seattle.

*Zagreb has a lot to point you toward. The bicycle appears to be making its own decisions.*

Much of Zagreb was still enrobed in exterior scaffolding due to the 2020 6.4 magnitude earthquake (there were actually TWO that year). With a population less than 6 million people, and lots of very old buildings, I can see where having a small tax base makes all the fixes a protracted endeavor. One of the remarkable things about all the guides is how well versed in history they were. They were talking about dates in 1081, and 1400s. Being an American we have only a fraction of that history to remember.

While we were in Zagreb, there was very high security at the Esplanade Zagreb Hotel where we stayed. Apparently there was an international financial conference being held there. The police stopped the cars and tram on the street and we watched from the front steps of the hotel as an entourage of vehicles displaying Ukrainian flags rolled up. We tried to be inconspicuous, thinking that we might catch a glimpse of Volodymyr Zelenskyy – the leader of the besieged Ukraine, but, alas, it was not him.

Ljubljana, Slovenia is smaller, warmer, and aggressively charming. The Dragon Bridge and its four bronze guardian dragons, the old town’s distinctive Art Nouveau facades, the castle on the hill above – Ljubljana operates at a human scale that lets you actually be somewhere rather than trying to keep up with it.

*Ljubljana’s old town. The decorated façade at left belongs to the Cooperative Bank building, designed by Maks Fabiani with distinctive folk-Art Nouveau ornamentation.*

Ljubljana punches above its weight architecturally. And yet it’s compact and EXTREMELY walkable – especially from our hotel the Grand Hotel Union Eurostars, Ljubljana. If you have been struggling with that city name (which I did for a LONG TIME) there is an easy way to get it right: just pretend the “J”s are “Y”s. Lyublyana (or Li-u-bli-an-a, if you’d rather). It was my second favorite city. (Prague and Budapest tied for first).

*One of the four copper dragons of Dragon Bridge. The city’s coat of arms features a dragon; the bridge takes the heraldry literally. They are said to bring good luck to true-born Ljubljanans.*

*Ljubljana Castle courtyard, Slovenian flag above the clock tower. The castle dates to the 12th century; the city has been climbing the hill to visit it ever since.*

Lake Bled: Save the Best for Last

A day trip from Ljubljana to Lake Bled, was perhaps, the best day of the trip. Bled is one of those places that looks like a screensaver and turns out to be better in person, which feels like a minor miracle.

A glacial lake. A medieval castle on a cliff above the eastern shore. A Baroque church on a tiny natural island in the center of the lake, the only natural island in Slovenia, is reached by traditional flat-bottomed boats called pletnas. Julian Alps rising snow-capped in every direction. Even in late March, in mildly overcast weather, it was remarkable.

*The Church of the Assumption on Bled Island, photographed from Bled Castle above. There has been a place of worship on this island since the 8th century. The current church dates to the 17th.* The 10x zoom on the phone came in handy here.

One of the nice things about our Croatia and Slovenia extension is that because it was the beginning of the season there were just four of us. We fit comfortably into a van and were ferried around everywhere with one constant guide and driver. A lovely couple from Tennessee were good company throughout.

*Near Bled: an Alpine house with the Julian Alps rising behind it. Slovenia is a serious mountain country and doesn’t get enough credit for it.*

Viking vs. Viking: The Comparison

For anyone wondering whether a river cruise redeems the ocean cruise experience, here is the short version:

The river cruise wins on intimacy, stability, and access. 190 passengers on flat water, docked in city centers every night. You wake up in Budapest, not anchored somewhere offshore. The crew knows your name by day two. Nothing flies off the tables.

The ocean cruise wins on scale and spectacle when the weather cooperates – and the Norwegian fjords (when we finally reached them in Eidfjord) were every bit as spectacular as promised. When the weather doesn’t cooperate, it wins on spectacle of a different kind. See: the original article.

The Danube Waltz itinerary packs an exceptional density of civilization into eight days of sailing: the Wachau Valley, Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest – all dockside, all walkable from the gangway. Add Prague, Zagreb, and Ljubljana as bookends and you have a genuinely hard-to-beat two-week itinerary through the heart of Central Europe.

Would we cruise Viking again? We already answered that question by booking this one. We’d do it again. Perhaps not in the North Sea. In January.

Photographer’s Post Trip Observation

We chose to travel with one suitcase each and one carry-on each. Instead of bringing my normal photo backpack laden with camera gear, I chose to try JUST using the phone. I definitely missed some great night sky and landscape photo opportunities. I definitely wished I had brought a simple tripod. The one huge mistake I made though: I forgot to turn on GPS location tagging for my photos until near the end of the trip. But the phone did afford me with good photos, communication, and I was able to use GPS (from the tracking app I used). That tracking turned out to be a life saver in remembering which of thousands of photos came from where.

All in all it was not a terrible trade off – especially since the 5x and 10x lenses on the Samsung came in handy on several occasions. It would have been much harder to do without bringing multiple seriously large lenses. I think next trip, however, I’m going to lug the big tripod and the “real” camera.

If you’ve cruised the Danube Waltz or visited any of these cities, drop a note in the comments. And if you want context on why anything short of a hurricane felt like a triumph on this trip, the original Viking Vela story is here.

About the images: All photos taken with a Samsung S24 Ultra unless otherwise noted. GPS tracks were recorded throughout the trip.

Titanic Adventures in the North Sea

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^{Released: January 22, 2025}
^{Edited: April 3, 2026 (add links)}

Viking Vela at Ålesund dock (from webcam)

To celebrate our December, 2024 retirement my wife and I booked an Aurora Borealis Cruise with Viking. We had previously cruised with Viking for a Rhine River cruise which I never documented, but briefly describe here for context. The river cruise occurred in November, 2021 from Basel, Switzerland to Amsterdam, Netherlands. It was originally scheduled to depart in May, 2020 but… COVID! We stuck it out until it was actually possible to go.

About the images: I reserve all rights to use of these images for any commercial purpose. You may use them as backgrounds or wallpaper for your personal use, but any other use requires a license. The majority of these images were taken with a Samsung S24 Ultra phone.

So, the great retirement getaway was meant to combine two of our goals: Seeing the Aurora Borealis again (we were fortunate to see them in December, 2023 in Fairbanks, Alaska), and visiting the Fjords of Norway. I had suspicion that the cruise might be dicey as the North Sea and Norwegian coast are rather famous for big seas and fierce winds in winter. Well, there were big seas and fierce winds! The first day of cruising was a stop in Ijmuiden (Amsterdam) and the weather was fabulously sunny. We enjoyed a canal boat tour.

The “Dancing Houses” of Amsterdam. They all lean in different directions due to being built on wooden poles that are hundreds of years old.

Sailing out of Amsterdam toward our next destination of Narvik, Norway, we knew there would be almost 2 full days of sailing as Narvik is quite far north.

Leaving Amsterdam looking over the pool deck and retractable roof.

But despite the captains warning that seas may be a bit rough and encouragement that our course would spare us much of the ruckus, there was a big squall starting and we were not able to outrun it. By about 10 PM, the ship was rolling about 5 degrees side to side as measured by my bubble level app. Before the big rolling I measured the listing as 6.8 degrees starboard and to port (during the biggest heaves, I measured 9.5 degrees sway to each side!)

The Norwegian Sea wave forecast for 2 PM Norwegian Time (source) looked menacing. The crosshair is approximately where I expected we’d be at that time, but what you can’t see is that the storm was coming up in the direction we were sailing. Here you see wave heights forecast to as high as 10.5 meters (34 feet).
At about 11 PM the rolling measured 6 degrees side to side on my bubble level. I wedged my boots into the closet door to stop it from slamming, and stowed all the breakables. I know several folks had their sliding doors break the closet they were in.

If This Boat’s a Rockin’

By 1:00 CET, the ship was rolling up to 7 degrees side to side. I awoke at 1:30 CET due to the tossing and with my wife’s blessing went down to the first deck to watch the Washington Commanders vs the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the executive lounge (where the internet was better). While there, and about 10 minutes before the end of the game the BIG rolling began at about 3:45.

The captain estimated the winds at 100 mph gusts, and seas of up to 37 feet. His first efforts were to turn the ship to keep the wind from causing the rolling. However at some point, that seemed to make matters worse. The first big rolling jolt toppled marble-top tables, flung open cabinets and contents went spilling. Two ladies came down to guest services on the first deck where I was because their water carafes and glasses had shattered in their stateroom. Another guy down there (Matt) said he thought he should go check on his girlfriend… I should have done the same. While the football game was still going on I captured some movies and still shots, and when the game ended (with a bounced-in walk-off field goal!) I returned to our stateroom (6092 at the port side stern) via the 7th deck where the pool is located. The pool area had massive mayhem as you can see in the photos below. I took the stairs because the elevators were making ominous banging noises in the rolling sea.

Bodily Injuries

My wife attempted to keep items from flying off the desk in our stateroom but was instead launched from the bedside to the window. That wasn’t enough injury, so as she got up after being hurled, a tray with daily news and menus sailed off a table and struck her in the forehead above her left eye. It broke the tray and left her with a goose egg that went black and blue under her hair and over the next 6 days turned into a black eye.

By the time I got back to our room, I was measuring 9.5 degrees tilt from starboard to port (19 degrees total). I was able to flag a steward to bring an ice pack for my wife – and our cabin attendant kept us supplied with ice ever after.

We met several passengers with black eyes, and others recounted broken ribs a broken finger, a broken toe, and a broken nose. So, yeah, it was rough for many of the 998 passengers and 465 crew. Many of the crew told us they had never been in such difficult seas. Many of the injuries were from being thrown out of bed into the nightstands – but that tended to occur for those on upper decks (6, 7 and 8). Another person recounted getting hit in the shin by the shower door as they were on the throne. One of the black eye situations was a woman who was thrust from the bathroom to the sliding glass doors. She had a concussion and lingering pain, and double black eyes. The days following the rough and tumble seas reminded me of the scene in Jaws where they compared scars with one another.

We can’t speak highly enough of the great care, professionalism and kindness shown by the crew. Our cabin steward, as I noted took excellent care of us.

The captain, Rune Loekling, made announcements frequently through the night reassuring everyone that the ship was built to take the conditions. He asked everyone to stay in their staterooms for safety and that persisted through breakfast and lunch (the crew brought fruits and boiled eggs to the room for a late breakfast, and a cooked meal with salmon and beef for a late lunch. We diverted to Ålesund, Norway, arriving in port at about 21:00, though once in the protected fjord the weather no longer rocked and rolled the ship so furiously and folks were able to leave their staterooms to get dinner at about 18:30. It was a total of about 19 hours of “motion”. My main concern is that much could have been done to minimize the damage by encouraging passengers and crew to stow breakables (many people had water carafes and glasses on slippery surfaces and those resulted in broken glass). Viking could even provide a checklist of things to do when heavy seas are expected or encountered.

The captain kept mentioning that the “pounding” was a normal occurrence of the bow hitting the waves. I was curious how much different it was for those near the bow so I ventured to the port side of the pool deck (7th deck) at almost 10:00 where I could record the seas. Watch and you’ll see a huge splash as the bow hits a wave. Also, I’m not sure what it was that was hanging down, I noticed it wasn’t there later, so perhaps something else that had been damaged in the storm. I also took the opportunity to get more ice for my wife’s head.

Ship Damage

Damage was rather extensive. Not many people saw it because they were doing a lot of cleanup while passengers were encouraged to remain in their staterooms.

Damage in the pool area. Broken glass, overturned tables, and contents spilled from cabinets and bookshelves.

Aftermath of the First Big Rolls aboard the Viking Vela

While the pool area damage was the most striking, I noticed lots of bits of damage, including 4 washer/dryer units that toppled in the laundrette and damaged wall panels,

Notice the dented wall panels from the washer/dyers falling over.

The Aquavit lounge outdoor in the stern was pummeled with sailing marble-top tables and was smashed off its mounting, and much of it’s (quartz?) exterior was battered and smashed along with perhaps a half dozen shattered table tops. Indeed one of the outdoor glass barriers at the side of the stern port side was shattered, though still intact.

Finally the grand glass and steel staircase leading up from the Explorers lounge on the 7th deck in the bow had a large curved panel that was shattered and removed. The staircase was roped off for the rest of the cruise though I didn’t observe any other obvious damage to the stairway.

There were several places where either buckling or impacts from heavy falling items damaged the floor tiles. They replaced floor tiles near the starboard World Cafe entrance, at the starboard exit of the Explorers lounge. On the second floor there is a two-stage exit from the atrium to the outside of the ship. During the melee the forward most port side door was wide open (probably held so by the wind), and the inner sliding glass door was leaning inward with spray and was also half open with wind and rain howling in. I pushed the inner door into its channel to reduce the wind and spray – I wasn’t about to go near the outer door! However in the morning the right half of that sliding door had only a fifth of the bottom remaining the rest had apparently been sheared or broken off. I suspect the pounding from going into the waves is what did in that door as well as that large curved glass at the base of the Explorer Lounge stairway.

Altered Itinerary

It was clear our itinerary was going to be impacted. We believed it meant that Narvik would be removed from the schedule and instead we’d sail to Tromsø – the next planned port. But instead we remained in Ålesund for almost 5 days to allow for repairs an inspections and to avoid the still turbulent seas. Some speculated that the reason for remaining in port was to repair the Azipod drive/steering system, but that is unconfirmed.

We finally sailed out from Ålesund on the 7th day of the 13-day trip. However all the northern locations, and an interim planned excursion to Flåm were removed and instead we sailed south.

I was excited when they announced the trip to Flåm up a long fjord, but that too, was cancelled. Fortunately we did make it to Eidfjord which also had calm water and much better weather.

Alesund harbor at night. — Ålesund, Norway harbor at night

Eidfjord was Spectacular

Not only was the weather cooperative, but the setting was every bit as expansive and beautiful as I had imagined. It did make me sad that we didn’t get to see Narvik, Tromsø, or Alta because that fjord magic was perhaps the key thing we were interested in.

The bow of the Viking Vela in the Hardanger fjord adjacent to Eidfjord.

The Aurora Did Show Up!

In the evening as we left Eidfjord at about 21:00 Norway time, the aurora was spotted to our stern and there was a great rush of folks to the aft and starboard side of the ship.

Eidfjord aurora above the Viking ship Vela. — A consolation aurora visible from the stern, starboard side of the ship on the way to Stavanger from Eidfjord.

Gallery of Cruisers

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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela passengers. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near EidFjord, Norway
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Viking Vela crew. Jan. 19, 2025 beneath the Aurora Borealis near Eidfjord, Norway

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These cruisers saw me taking photos and asked to be photographed under the agreement that their photos are displayed here publicly. Those people who are pictured are free to copy and use the photos in anyway they wish. I have added my copyright/watermark to them to prevent random pilfering, however unwatermarked photos are also available by clicking the watermarked ones (once I get it working!). Right click the image and select download to save it (or whatever is the equivalent on your browser of choice).

NOTE: If you would like for your photo(s) to be removed, please use the contact form on the site, send me an email asking for your photo(s) to be removed. Be sure to specify WHICH photo is of you, e.g. “NO20250119_6005” (or just _6005 for short). Allow up to 30 days for me to remove your photo as I travel and don’t always have access to the site.

About these photos: all these photos were taken with the following equipment and settings:
Sony A7RIII, 15-35mm f/2.8 Cannon lens, @17 mm, f/2.8, 3200 ISO, 8 seconds, Daylight white balance. None of the photos have been edited, they are straight out of the camera.

Course Departure

Due to the loss of Narvik, Tromsø and Alta, the ports of Eidfjord, mentioned above and Stavanger were added to the itinerary.

In Stavanger an excursion by boat to Pulpit Rock in the Lysefjord was one of my favorite side-trips.

The original cruise had this itinerary:

1. London -> Amsterdam
2. Amsterdam
3, 4 at sea
5. Narvik
6, 7. Tromso (2 nights)
8, 9. Alta (2 nights)
10, 11. at sea
12, 13. Bergen

The actual itinerary was this

1. London -> Amsterdam
2. Amsterdam
3 at sea
4. confined to stateroom -> Alesund
5, 6, 7, 8. Alesund
9. Flam (canceled Alesund)
10. Eidfjord
11. Stavanger
12, 13. Bergen

External references to this event.

Is Anybody on Board the Viking Vela Now (REDDIT)
Viking Vela Diverted for Repairs (Cruise Hive)
Viking Vela Stranded in Norway (Candid Cruise)

If you were on this ship for this or a subsequent cruise, feel free to comment, provide me with photos or videos and I can add them to this page.

I think it’s also fair to say that Viking initially offered every passenger a 60% fare voucher toward any cruise booked within 1 year. This occurred once we faced our 3rd day stuck in Ålesund. However before departing the ship on the last day in Bergen, the voucher was increased to 100% – meaning, effectively that the cruise was 50% off IF you book another cruise. The voucher excludes any shore excursions actually taken, and any self arranged hotel or airfare. Since we arranged our air travel and pre and post stays ourselves, that also would not be included. I suspect those wouldn’t have been included in the voucher even had they been booked as part of the cruise package.

Also, worth mentioning that Viking upgraded everyone to the “Silver Spirits” beverage package for free for the last half of the cruise. That comes to $50 per day for 2 people or about $350 value. That freebie unlocked some better wines, but not being much of a drinker we didn’t gain much value from the offer.

Before the Cruise – London

Having your plans dashed because of a plane delay is never fun, so we booked 3 pre-cruise days in London, and an extra post-cruise day in Bergen. Also getting accommodated to a whole new timezone can be daunting. We stayed in the Shard (aka the Shangri-La) which is one of the tallest hotels in London. It was truly awesome and I believe a much better value than booking a pre-cruise stopover via Viking.
Nearby were the London Bridge, the Tower Bridge, and the Eye of London – though the latter was closed for maintenance. One day was cold and rainy, the other days were merely cold. A former co-worker and friend came to visit with us and took us on a tour of the surrounding area. That was better than any tour we might have booked.

The Tower Bridge in the background with friends Kevin and Jennifer and my lovely wife, tricia… and me at the right.

London: The shard is at the left, the London Bridge in the center.

View from the 39th floor of the Shangri-La hotel. The Eye is at the upper left, the London Bridge at the right hand side.

Looking back onto London as we departed for Tillbury Port for the cruise.

About the images: I reserve all rights to use of these images for any commercial purpose. You may use them as backgrounds or wallpaper for your personal use, but any other use requires a license. The majority of these images were taken with a Samsung S24 Ultra phone.

Photographing Aurorae with a Night Capable Camera

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Photo 1: Jupiter and diffuse, but bright aurora on our first night. ***f/3.5, 5 sec, ISO 4000, 20mm***

This is part 2 of a multi-part series on observing and photographing an Aurora. Please read Aurora: The Bewitching Glow for background information including information about what an aurora is, when, how and where it can be seen, and photographs from Aurorae we observed near Fairbanks, Alaska.

So I Have to Get Lucky?

Before we jump into the details and the 3 keys for getting a good aurora photo, I think it is wise to set expectations about how likely you are to see a truly astounding aurora. Photo 1, above is one of the first captures I got on the first night on site (December 14). It was unexpected because the weather had been completely overcast all day. On December 17, the display was ASTOUNDING. I asked staff at Borealis Basecamp – which caters to aurora goers – as well as locals in Fairbanks, and I poured over the data to determine just how lucky we were to see the jaw dropping display we observed. The short answer is… “luck comes over time”. We used the Book and Hope method described in the first article to observe the aurora, arriving on December 14, 2023 and departing on December 18th – that is 4 nights onsite. But because we didn’t use the Monitor and Go method what we couldn’t have foreknown is how much the sun would cooperate with our aurorae dreams.

Diagram 1: M and X class solar flares in December, 2023.

Take a glance at Diagram 1, above from the SpaceWeatherLive.com archive. Fortuitously the most energetic solar flare (category X) in the preceding SIX YEARS occurred on the first day we arrived (and on New Years eve). The solar wind travels at over a million miles an hour (1.6 million kilometers per hour). But the sun is 92 million miles (147 million kilometers) away, so the effect of the flare on aurora production may occur in as little as 36 hours or as many as 4 days later. Even during a solar maximum events of this magnitude only occur infrequently. December 2023 saw two X class flares in one month – there were zero X class flares in the prior 5 months at all! The Kp Index exceeded 5 a total of 16 times in the 4 month period which means an exceptional once a week event might be a reasonable expectation during this part of the solar cycle.

Eli Fox, the chief photographer at Borealis Basecamp and the man who runs much of the Borealis Basecamp social media [Instagram] [Facebook] told me that exceptional aurora events occur on average about once a month or less.

A solid plan and good luck go hand in hand. But do not let that dissuade you. The displays we saw on two other nights were very pleasing and still produced great pictures.

Can I Get a Good Photo with ANY Camera?

Photographing aurorae is not different from the night photography we cover extensively on this site. If your camera is able to take acceptable Milky Way photos, it’s a good candidate – the aurora is generally much brighter than the brightest portions of the Milky Way.

Photo 2: Looking up. Bright fast moving aurora. Notice The big dipper at the left.
***f/2.8, 2 sec, ISO 6400, 18 mm***

While these articles are now starting to show their age, the principles still apply:

Surprisingly, some cell phones can do a respectable job and we will cover using cellphones in the next article in the series.

For any night photography the following minimums are recommended:

a sturdy triopd,
- a (ball) head and
  - a quick release, and
    - a shutter release (e.g. an Intervalometer) whether cabled or wireless. I prefer cabled intervalometers as I’ve had things go horribly wrong with wireless ones.

It also helps to become very familiar with the settings and controls for your camera and tripod – familiar enough that you can operate them in the dark with little or no additional light. That level of familiarity comes with practice… so if you are out of the habit, we strongly suggest practicing in your back yard (or in a dark closet). Practice while wearing the gloves that you intend to use! I discovered that merino wool glove liners were sufficient to keep my dominant hand warm even when the temperature dipped to -20F – but there was no wind and I avoided allowing any snow to remain on my glove liner – preferring to use my gloved hand or jacket sleeve when brushing away snow. Snow on my glove liner would have melted due to my body heat and made me miserable. I carried a pair of outer gloves with me, in fact, I kept a glove on my non-dominant hand at all times while my dominant hand had only the glove liner. The other outer glove remained in my pocked with a chemical hand warmer activated should my hand get cold!

Additional Photo Gear for Dealing with Excessive Cold

I brought quite a lot of gear to prepare for the affects of extreme cold on my person and my camera equipment. The camera equipment I brought included:

1. Five power banks – these were used to power “dew heaters” (aka lens warmers), as well as heated clothing.
2. Four of the powerbanks also were hand-warmers, most have built in lights.
3. Pouches in which I could keep the powerbanks, chemical handwarmers, as well as cables.
4. A large sealable plastic bag that can hold the entire camera and lens.
5. Carabiners to hold the pouches to my tripod.
6. And my standard practice of affixing velcro to key places near the top of my tripod with the mating velcro on the back of my intervalometer(s). This keeps the intervalometer in a usable place and prevents it from falling or catching the wind.

The pouches had operational electric hand warmers or chemical hand warmers to keep the power bank in them warm. I thought about, but did not use external batteries for my camera. Conceptually using external batteries permits using a larger battery (or using plug-in power) as well as keeping the camera batteries warm without warming the camera. The extreme cold is GOOD for your images. Deep sky astrophotographers typically use super-cooled sensors for their work, and your camera benefits from the cold, too, in the form of less noise.

If you use chemical hand warmers (charcoal, salt and iron filings), they need some airflow to keep generating heat – so don’t put them in a bag with no airflow. Indeed, if you want to reuse them, you can put them in as small a possible plastic bag to extend their life.

However I did keep spare batteries in my interior pockets where my body heat would keep them warm should I need to swap batteries. With the power banks, I also brought extra cables, an extension cord, and a 7 station USB charger. Of course all the regular stuff is needed, too… battery chargers for your camera batteries, cables, lens cloths and more. Another item I strongly recommend is gaffers tape which you can use to seal viewfinders, and lock down focus settings. And a large Ziplock bag. I also like to use a lens band (basically a large rubber band) to prevent focus or zoom settings from changing unexpectedly.

What Can Go Wrong?

Several aurora photographers wondered why I brought dew-heaters (lens warmers). These devices wrap around the end of the lens and via a power bank keep the lens warmer than the surrounding air to prevent dew (condensation) or frost from forming on the lens. Those with more experience than me typically did not use such devices because in the extreme cold dew is not typically a problem. BUT I did have complications I didn’t anticipate. In warmer, more humid climates, dew heaters can be the difference between getting a shot of “lens fog” and getting a great night shot.
The lens warmer is attached by cable to a power bank. More than once the pouch containing the power bank got bumped off my tripod yanking down on the lens ring which, unfortunately, altered either the zoom or the focus of the lens. In part for that reason I stopped using the lens warmer. But I did notice that more than once my breath crystalized on the outer lens surface. The take away here: in the extreme cold, keep your breath away from the camera as much as possible! And if you do use a lens warmer, find a secure way to attach it to your tripod so it can not yank on your lens.

From time to time I would use the viewfinder to frame my shot. But on my Sony Alpha 7R III camera, the frost from my breath condensed on the viewfinder resulting in two problems. The moist air from my breath froze on and made the viewfinder cloudy and I couldn’t see through it, and the sensor that turns off the back LCD when your eye is at the sensor got confused and refused to turn the LCD on. Effectively I was unable to use the LCD or the viewfinder to make adjustments. Fortunately this happened as the aurora was quiescing so I put my camera in a SEALABLE plastic bag, and brought it indoors.

Bag Your Camera! And Other Tips…

Why bag your camera? If you take your very cold camera indoors it will almost immediately form frost and condensation in the warmer more humid air – much like your iced drink glass forms condensation. Unfortunately condensation can occur INSIDE the lens and INSIDE the camera (e.g. on the sensor). Whenever I move the camera from a cold environment to a warmer one I bag and seal it and keep it in the bag until it has warmed to room temperature (about 1 to 3 hours). I can take it back out to a cold environment immediately if I wish. Keeping desiccant in the bag is not a bad idea, either! Oh, and you may find it advisable to remove your memory card and battery from the camera before bagging it so that you can examine the contents of the card or charge the battery while you have the bagged camera in a warmer environment.

Another unanticipated problem was that the extreme cold made the intervalometer cord quite stiff. It behaved more like a coat hanger than a wire. I strongly recommend using either a corded, or cordless intervalometer – you need it as a shutter release. The reason for the shutter release is to keep from adding any shake or wobble to the process of taking a photo – which occurs just by pressing the shutter button. A shutter release locked in “on mode” also allows you to take endless shots unattended which if you wish, you can assemble into a star trail like the photo below.

Photo 6: Applying Comet style star trails (with a satellite) (97) 6-second exposures. (each f/3.5, ISO 4000, 19mm) Total 9 min 42 secs.

Finally, I had difficulty adjusting the settings using the top dial on my camera – I believe also due to frost from my breath. I say “I believe” because it occurs to me that with my lightly gloved hand I may have been trying to rotate the function knob instead of the upper adjustment wheel. REMINDER: Get familiar with your camera before you get into the exciting environment where you may easily forget a step or two while gawking at the sky.

The Three Most Important Aurora Tips

Once you have all your gear, have a solid tripod (which you set up properly and securely) and are ready to begin photographing the amazing aurora… there are three very important things to NOT skimp on doing and double checking.

Confirm (check) focus frequently especially after any bumps or changes in zoom.
Do NOT judge the quality of the exposure by the display on the LCD. The only way to insure a good exposure is to look at the histogram (separate RGB channels is best).
Adjust your exposure as needed to meet the circumstance. Aurora can go from dim to very bright and very bright to dim. They can move hardly at all, and they can dance about in the sky at a dizzying pace. So this means not only should you pay attention to those exposures, but you might want to avoid fixating on one area of the sky.

Tip 1: Checking and Setting Focus

The best way to check focus is to shoot an image and zoom in and check for the sharpness of any stars on the LCD. The best way to get focus right is to pre-focus at infinity when there is sufficient light (e.g. using a streetlight, the moon or a very bright star). While cameras can SOMETIMES successfully self focus most of the time they cannot without bright, motionless light in the distance. One way to get a good focus is to use live view, zoom in and hand adjust focus until a star is as compact as possible. But do not stop there… TURN OFF auto focus! You can set some lenses to “MF” or “Manual Focus”, but another strategy – perhaps easier – is to set your camera to do focus only when you press a separate focus button. Typically a camera is set to focus as you press the shutter – and that’s definitely NOT what you want.
If you’re not sure where to focus, we recommend either focusing on stars or if that seems difficult, you can focus on anything that is more than 50 feet away from you and that will be sufficient for wide-angle lenses.

Then take an exposure and confirm the focus is spot on. I took a whole sequence of exposures with lovely snow flocked trees in the foreground, but I made the mistake of not confirming my focus was spot on! It is also worth noting that the aurora may be diffuse and therefore not have a clear focus point… so don’t judge by the aurora! By the way, we also strongly recommend that you set a fixed White Balance (e.g. cloudy or daylight), disable long exposure noise reduction, and turn on high ISO noise reduction.

Some cameras have a “focus peaking” setting that you can enable. Focus peaking colors those areas of the image that are in focus (red is easier to distinguish in a night shot). This tip comes from Eli Fox, and is something I did not know is present on my Sony!

One last tip, focus MAY change as the lens gets colder or warmer – so do check periodically.

Tip 2: Verify Proper Exposure using the Histogram Feature

Diagram 2: An aurora photo with over exposed elements (see red pointers). The histogram (top right) shows a spike at the right – brightest end – of the range.

My modus operandi when shooting is to hand shoot a few images doing the focus check AND a histogram check before I set the camera up to take continuous exposures. I then periodically stop the exposures to double check the histogram. One additional help here is to turn on over exposure highlighting if your camera supplies it. With that feature on, over exposed areas will generally blink where there are overexposed pixels to let you know what areas are over. Overexposure is very difficult to recover from. The goal is to minimize the overexposures but get the images as “bright” as possible to capture the most information. I then usually shoot a shot with the lens cap on (or my hand covering the lens) so I can tell that I’ve changed settings or adjusted the field of view. Elements at the “bright” end of the spectrum by themselves don’t mean there are over exposures. By the way this is also why we strongly recommend you shoot your photos in RAW – or like we do RAW plus the smallest JPEGs.

Tip 3: Do Not Fixate

This tip has two parts. Do not forget to recheck at LEAST your exposure histograms periodically, and do not fail to look around in the sky. While you might have the perfect foreground, the aurora behind you or above you may be the most spectacular thing you will ever see. If you do not get a photo, it may as well have never happened! And while we are on this subject, do you notice how GREEN the snow appears in the right side of the photo below (as well as earlier photos)? They are reflecting the predominate color (557.7 nano meters wavelength) coming from the aurora. This is one of the possible problems with obtaining natural looking aurora photos.

Photo 5: The recorded color (right) gives an eerie green, but the left is hand desaturated in post processing.

As noted in Aurora: The Bewitching Glow (part one of this series), there are other colors as well. This can have the affect of making the landscape look “eerie”. Eerie landscapse can be combatted in two ways. One way is to be thankful for and take advantage of light pollution (or some moonlight), and the other is to post process the photo to desaturate the areas that look unnatural e.g. as is done above in photo 5. All the other rules of good photo composition apply as well. If the photo would look pleasing without an aurora, then it will be even better if there is an aurora. But if the scene is chaotic or not well framed, it will take an incredibly amazing aurora to save it. I think the main take away here is: experiment with different compositions, directions and settings.

One last point. The aurora can move very slowly or surprisingly rapidly. If you take a long exposure for a fast moving aurora it will “smear”. But a dim, slow moving aurora may require a longer exposure or a higher ISO or both. Consider the examples below. At the left is an approximation of one ten second, ISO-6400 exposure (f/2.8, 18 mm) created by combining 5 2-second exposures and the second is a single 2 second exposure. The “eye” of the aurora is overexposed and much of the swirly detail is lost. However even if the ISO had been dialed down or the aperture stopped down to prevent overexposure, the capture over the longer time interval would lose some of the fine detail – in much the way that a moving flashlight or a moving camera would create a smear. But do notice that more stars are visible in the longer exposure because 10 seconds is sufficiently short for an 18mm shot that the stars themselves are not smeared (much). To understand this a bit better, the best resource we know of is
described in our article: 600 Rule ?

In fact, if you’d like to get an idea how fast an aurora CAN move in real time, here is a video sequence – not a timelapse – from Eli Fox

VIDEO: Real Time aurora used by permission from Eli Fox.

Well, that’s it for how to use a “night capable camera” to take aurora photos. But stay tuned, we have at least two more articles on the subject coming soon including:

How to Take Aurora Photos with a Cell Phone

All about Borealis Basecamp

As always, feel free to ask questions using the comments below. Thanks for the gift of your time reading this… and if you’ve found value in it, please do share the link with those you know who would appreciate it.

Aurora: The Bewitching Glow

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First published 06-Jan-2024. Last revised 07-Jan-2024

Who doesn’t want a photo of a curvaceous near-earth phenomenon called an Aurora? Not you? Well if not, you need not read on. But if you’re thinking that sounds interesting then you’ve found a good place to hone up on aurora and aurora photography. We’ll address what aurora are, how to plan for them, equipment, and photography methods including how to get decent photos from night capable cameras and typical current generation cell phones. In many ways aurora photography is similar to trying to catch meteors – see: Coaxing a Meteor into Smiling for your Camera – only aurora are easier!

Until recently, photo 3, below was the only aurora photo I was ever able to capture, and it was in 2011 while travelling back by plane from the Royal Observatory in London where I had won Astronomy Photographer of the Year, 2010. While flying over Canada, I noticed an odd glow that seemed to be moving unexpectedly. Suspecting it might be an aurora borealis, I covered the window up as best I could with a dark coat while simultaneously holding my camera against the window for a 4 second exposure on a bumpy flight. The camera immediately registered the tell-tale green color which wasn’t visible to my eye.

What IS an Aurora? and What Does it Look like “In Person”?

An aurora (which is named after the Roman goddess of Dawn) occurs when the sun ejects charged particles toward the earth. Those charged particles are warped by our earth’s magnetosphere which concentrates them like a lens and they then collide with components of our atmosphere (in the ionosphere and thermosphere) as high up as 1000 miles to as low as 30 miles above the earth. Note that the magnetosphere is centered around the earth’s magnetic poles, not the geographic poles. The north magnetic pole continuously moves and is presently near 81°18′N 110°48′W which is Ellsmere Island, Canada NOT at the geographic north pole (90°N). The location of the north magnetic pole within the North American continent is fortuitous for those of us who live in the extreme northern United States especially for those in Alaska, and Canada. Though the band of possible aurora sighting locations is broad and includes other northern countries and continents it favors Northern North America. Aurorae (the plural of Aurora) that occur in the Northern hemisphere are called Aurora Borealis from Boreas, the Greek god of the north wind. Those in the Southern hemisphere are named after the Greek god of the southern wind: Auster and are called Aurora Australis.

Other interesting places in the world to see the Aurora Borealis include the northern areas of Norway, Sweden, Lapland, Iceland, Greenland and Finland as well as the Siberian region of Russia. In the south, Aurora can sometimes be seen in New Zealand, the Southern tip of Chile (e.g. Tierra del Fuego) or the Falklands. In the south, however the best place would be on the continent of Antarctica.

All you really need to see an aurora is a reasonably dark sky and sufficient solar wind to produce a strong aurora. Aurora have no seasonality. The anticipated strength (brightness) of the aurora is forecast by the “Kp Index“. Unlike the apparent magnitude scale used by astronomers in which the smaller the number the brighter the object, the Kp scale goes from 1 to 9 with 9 being the brightest and MOST likely to produce aurora. During our sojourn in the Fairbanks area, the scale ran from 2 Kp to 5 Kp – and as I note below that 5 Kp event on December 17th was awe inspiring.

But what does an aurora look like in person?

Blurry cellphone photo of an Aurora:
f/1.8, ISO-3200, 4 sec — Photo 4: Aurora as it might appear to the eye. (Taken with a cell phone)

Most aurora will appear gray to the human eye which is poor at discerning color in dim light. A camera can capture the true color, and that color is generally predominately green due to the interaction of the charged particles with oxygen in the atmosphere. In Photo 4 you can see a peculiar diagonal glow that IS a diffuse aurora partially obscured by clouds and it is close to what it looked like to the naked eye – though the whole scene was dimmer in person.

What an aurora actually looks like depends on the overall sky darkness, the cloud cover, and the strength of the aurora. Just as seeing the true majesty of the Milky Way requires dark skies, the beauty and shape of the aurora is easier to spot in dark skies. A dim aurora might look exactly like the amorphous cloud in photo 4, above. In fact, many people who first notice aurora think they ARE clouds illuminated by moonlight or some distant city lights. A stronger, brighter aurora might have discernable hints of green, red or blue. And the aurora may also move quickly and chaotically about the sky in a display that can only be described as mesmerizing, and evocative. We got very lucky. Of the 4 nights we spent seeking the aurora we saw aurora on 3 of those nights, and the fourth night literally had this author in tears over the sheer beauty of what he saw. Don’t let this meager photo dissuade you… we’ll discuss in a bit how to get much better photos and show you much more delicious examples. We were fortunate in that there were two very large solar flares (class X) that occurred on December 14th

But here is a timelapse from the most energetic of the nights we watched. It zips along at about 15 times the actual speed.

Dance of the Northern Sky: December 17, 2023

Where can you See an Aurora? and WHEN?

Photo 5: Samsung cellphone Capture of Aurora at Borealis Basecamp, Fairbanks, Alaska

The short answer to the question is literally ANYWHERE with great good luck, but the the more accurate answer is near (about 20 degrees from) the north or south magnetic poles when the sky is dark and there is significant solar activity. The sun goes through an 11-year cycle from a quiet period (solar minimum) to lots of sunspots (solar maximum) and back to a quiet period. The sunspots are generally where the charged particles come from Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs). The next solar maximum is in 2024 and the previous maximum was 2013 but the years on either side of the maximum can be just as good as the year of the maximum -> so now you know why we went in 2023!

A more detailed explanation of WHERE includes these criteria:

A place with non light-polluted skies
near the arctic or antarctic magnetic poles but preferably not at the poles. The farther you are away from the magnetic poles, the less likely you are to see any aurora activity
generally favorable weather (meaning at least some clear skies).
a season when there is true night/darkness. For example August in Alaska would be a bad choice because it never gets truly dark – which is why it’s called the “Land of the Midnight Sun”. In late December through January Fairbanks and farther north could aptly be called the “Land of Perpetual Midnight”. The more dark, the better the chances!
travel distance and cost,
availability and cost of lodging,
and if you’re looking for that primo shot, consideration of the foreground for your shot (a flat field may not be as compelling as a snow flocked forest with a mountain poking out in the distance).
time on site. Aurora are a “Space Weather” phenomenon and that is apt in the sense that you might confidently book a one-night stay in Seattle, Washington and expect it to rain because it frequently does so, but the longer you stay at a site, the more likely you are to observe the Space Weather you’re interested in and hopefully the less likely that the snow, rain, clouds or fog are to completely blot out your aurora experience. The first night we were on site at Borealis Basecamp it had snowed all day and was a gloomy overcast, foreboding night. We thought it would be a bust and we could catch up on sleep, but at 2:00 AM it cleared enough that the Aurora was pretty awesome.

Photo 6: The first night after heavy cloud cover an aurora broke out. Orion is at the right, Gemini in the middle

One strategy is to book a place and hope that while you’re there you get an aurora. I call this tactic “Book and Hope“. But there is another tactic you can try, too.

Monitor and Go

Another approach is to pick where to go based on monitoring the Space Weather reports for strong solar events and correlating the aurora predictions with weather forecasts. You can immediately arrange travel to an accessible location in the US or Canada at the last minute since there are often 2 to 3 days between the observed solar activity (CMEs) and the increase in aurora activity. The Monitor and Go approach may cost more and require more flexibility. You may find that some of the best locations and tours are booked seasons in advance for those who took the book and hope approach. We are strong proponents of Having a Plan C – which means having alternatives pre-investigated in advance of any possible opportunity to see the aurora.

If not above latitude 45 or so the aurora will be low in the northern horizon. But the closer you get to the magnetic pole, the higher in the sky the phenomenon will occur. In fact, one driver in Fairbanks told me “we don’t call them the Northern Lights here we just call them The LIGHTS because for us they are usually overhead and seldom only in the north.”

If you don’t live in Alaska or Canada, but are lucky enough to live in the northern-most portions of the northern US the chances of seeing an aurora are pretty good on as many as 5 or 6 nights a year when there is significant space weather (Kp index forecast is greater than 5). It may just be a matter of figuring out what nearby location has the darkest skies toward the north. Some of my photo buddies in New England, Washington, and Idaho have managed several times through a year to get captures of an aurora when the activity level is high. See the Viewing the Aurora link, in the resource list below for a better understanding of Kp.

Aurora from New England captured by Brian Drourr — Brian Drourr captured this image near his home in Burlington, VT (used by permission) Click the image to visit Brian’s Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/brian.drourr

Where Did StarCircleAcademy Go?

For nearly all the reasons cited above, we chose to go during the winter to the area near Fairbanks, Alaska, and specifically to Borealis Basecamp which is located about 20 miles north of Fairbanks. We chose December for it’s longer nights and snowy environment (better for interesting foregrounds) even though December in Fairbanks has more cloud cover than say March. We’ll describe more about Borealis Basecamp in the next article, including features of the “igloo” accommodations offered, as well as weather considerations.

Gray, overcast skies at the Borealis Basecamp north of Fairbanks, Alaska, with a cheeky self portrait and a not-live Grizzly bear. — Photo 7: Borealis Basecamp accommodations. The grizzly bear wasn’t really there 🙂 This was created by combining a panorama with a photo from the Fairbanks Airport all in the Samsung cell phone. The panorama makes the igloo appear squashed (smaller) than it actually is. The model inside is the author’s wife.

Photo 8: The author in a Borealis Basecamp “Igloo” in pre-dawn hours with stars and multi-colored Aurora visible.

There is a downside to Fairbanks, Alaska. By going in Winter… there are only 4 or 5 hours of daylight, and the average high temperature hovers near zero Farenheit (-17 Celsius). Borealis Basecamp is 800 feet higher in altitude than Fairbanks, so is usually a few degrees warmer (cold air sinks and settles in low areas). Borealis Basecamp is situated north of Fairbanks which helps because the light pollution from Fairbanks only affects the southern skies. There are other areas worth considering in the vicinity of Fairbanks as well, like Chena Hot Springs, Chatanika Lodge, Aurora Borealis Lodge north east of Fox, and many more. You can also opt to stay in Fairbanks and charter expeditions that ferry you by van to the best available spots for photography. Or if you are accustomed to driving on ice and snow you can be brave and rent a car. Beware that locals don’t call them “roundabouts” they call them “slide-abouts”. The upside to residing in Fairbanks is that you can avail yourself of the variety of restaurants and amenities in Fairbanks and also get aurora photos. The disadvantage is that the aurora can pop up at any time so generally you’d want to be out from say 10 pm until 3 am to have a good chance of catching what does occur. In our case at the Borealis Basecamp (as is true at nearly ALL aurora oriented accommodations), they notified us by phone when an aurora was visible and it was a matter of looking through the windows to decide if it was worth donning all the layers of clothing and heading out of doors or just staying in bed and observing in comfort. Plus we had the advantage of retreating indoors for breaks or to rewarm as needed. Indeed, one morning the aurora display was dim but really awesome at 8 am!

Photo 9: Multicolor Aurora at Basecamp Igloo 301 – Glow from on site restaurant.

Resources and Links

Explaining Solar Cycles @Nasa
Viewing the Aurora @NOAA
30 Minute Aurora Forecast @NOAA
Aurora Forecast for Alaska @Geophysical Institute (Alaska.edu)
About Colors in the Aurora @Physics.stackexchange.com
Where and How Do Aurorae Occur @UCAR Center for Science Education
General Information About Aurorae @Wikipedia
Android (My Aurora Forecast Pro) or IOS App (My Aurora Forecast Pro) for predicting Aurora visibility WITH alerts. The Basecamp staff recommends this particular app.
Archive of Solar Flare Activity @SpaceWeatherLive.com
Live Solar Flare Activity Report @SpaceWeatherLive.com this resource contains reports emitted by NOAA and other sources.

Parts 2 and 3 of this Series:

2 Aurora Photography with A Night Capable Camera
+ What is a “Night capable” camera?
+ Equipment (Camera, Tripod, warmers, dew heaters, …)
+ Aurora aspects that dictate settings.
+ Adapting to conditions – both of the Aurora and the weather.
+ What to pay attention to to get the best results (there are 3 keys!)
+ Batteries, camera controls and tripods.
+ Aurora photography goals and considerations for getting a better picture.
+ Preparing for Winter in Alaska
+ Is -20 F survivable? (Short answer, yes!)
+ What should I bring / how should I dress?
+ What is Borealis Basecamp like?
+ Tips from Borealis Basecamp staff.

3. Aurora and Night Photography with a Cell Phone COMING SOON
+ Cellphone cameras – are they usable for aurora photos?
+ Stablizing a cell phone for better photos (both hardware and posture!)
+ iPhone settings – “Night” and “Pro” mode
+ Android phone settings “Night” and “Pro” mode
+ Handheld or stabilized?
+ How to hold a cellphone if you DO NOT have a tripod/stable base
+ Hands free photos (e.g. tripod plus voice command or bluetooth trigger)