As we were planing our trip about a year ago, we said to ourselves that no matter what we see, we ain't leavin' till we see the northern lights perform a dance for us...and just for us. As I have found out, this is a tall order to fill in the first couple of days in August as the northern lights don't really start sparking up until mid Octoberish. We were thinking maybe we need to extend the trip by a couple of more months..what sayeth ye dear readers, can you put up with another two months of this verbose dribble?
No need to worry, as we found ourseleves at about a mile high and in the shadow of dominating Mt. Fairplay at 5800 feet or so - I'm thinking, if we're gonna see the lights, a higher altitude above the low laying clouds might just work. My supposition was further confirmed by Debbie's investigation of the UofA Fairbanks website on northern lights viewing forecast - yes, they most definitely have this and it's cool as hell - google it. They rated tonight and tomorrow night a 5 on a 1 - 10 scale of viewing opportunites. Not bad I thought.
They base their forecast on many things but the key item seems to be sunspot/solar flare activity on El Sol. These sunspots generate powerful solar winds that carry an enormous number of energized particles across the Milky Way. These particles from the solar winds are attracted to and accumulate at the Earth's polar regions due to the magnetic forces found there and give us the aurora's. When these negatively charged particles hit the positive magnetic forces at the Poles huge amounts of energy are released in the form of light ranging from pale green to red based on energy level and altitude. The lowest, and I mean the lowest elevation of the bottom of an aurora is 60 miles above Earth. These would be the greenish hued lights, the red hues are probably 150 miles or so above Earth...so if you see some red you are truly looking inside of the heavens.
The second ingredient to the forecast model is a dark and cloud free night sky. Here's the big downer for hopes of an early August viewing..it doesn't get dark here in August. But, the main thing is the sunspot activity and the forecast showed a strong indicator here for the next two nights. I'm ready, let's haul burro to a higher elevation to weed out the low clouds and take our chances...and so we did.
Posted up near Mt Fairplay, AK
Round about midnight I say to Debbie - we haven't seen a star since we got to Alaska (the night sky stays too bright) and I suddenly spotted one....and there's another...Debbie spies another, cool - first stars we've seen in 2 months. It also seemed darker tonight than all previous nights here in AK, maybe this high altitude is helping? Dunno, it was weird. As we were focused on the night sky we see a hint of a light green flash in the northerly skies just to our right. Hmmm...it can't possibly be, can it...this early...no, we were just seeing things right? You know, since we wanted this so badly we thought our minds were talking us into seeing something that wasn't there.
At that precise moment the entire sky exploded with green and magenta light and stayed on fire for the next two hours!
Now the following still picture is the best I have and it does a disgrace to this majestic display but I attach for your consideration and general enjoyment anyway. In the picture you will see a blob of green light but when I took this photo the entire sky in my camera view window was filled with bright green. There is definitely a correct way to photograph these auroras and I ain't got it. Artificial light settings and shutter speed are key and I just don't have the right set up and skill to make it happen, sorry guys - but the photo ain't half bad. The best way to record these lights is a high quality video to see the mind boggling changes to shape, color, intensity and pure majesty these things put out...oh my God. The absolute best way to see them is to stand under them and be spellbound.
And to be captivated by this concerto of light at the start of my 60th year was a great gift that I didn't even have to unwrap or send any thank you notes for. A perfect night at the top of the world as Tom Petty chorused - "...and I...ain't....comin'.....down..." - just for us.
You need to click on this, sorry.
But Mr. Petty what goes up must come down so we left Mt. Fairplay noonish the next day as we needed a serious sleep in from our 3 AM viewing and dancing. We headed into the small mining camp turned tourist trap of Chicken, AK and got some food and cold drinks at the small cafe there. Permanent residents here number 5 during the winter and 8 during the summers. Got it's name because the miners wanted to call it Ptarmigan (pronounced tar - ma - gan with a hard g), which is a prolific bird up here that looks like a chicken and is as dumb as one too - but the poor old coots couldn't spell Ptarmigan so they named the place Chicken.
The bad part of all of this is that Chicken lies about 30 miles from the Canadian border which marks the end of our stay here in AK. We are really sad to be leaving because we have enjoyed ourselves immensely in this place. We have also learned and grown so much in these past couple of months and leaving is going to be hard to do.
But, for all the beauty and majesty we've seen it still doesn't come close to the beautiful and majestic family and friends we have and have missed. It will be great to get home and see everyone we've missed these past couple of months.
So, what to do on our last full day in AK? Let's go gold panning, see if we can find some nuggets to help underwrite the cost of this adventure. I am now convinced that the key to successful prospecting is to know what you're looking for.
Check out Klondike Kate staking out her mining claim on Jack Wade Creek, AK.
We've never been panning, always thought it was kind of hokey looking, but let me tell you we had grand time. Sun was hot, water felt refreshing, had a nice picnic lunch and a few beers and there's always that hope of a big nugget ending up in your pan. We borrowed pans from the camphost Bill here at the Walker Creek BLM campground where we stayed for 2 nites, he gave me a quick tutorial and off we went. We came back with what we thought were gold flakes but a panning expert camped next to us says nope, you got feldspar there. Feldspar? Does that sell at the same price as gold? Ah, no greenhorn, time for you to leave AK. Agreed.
Tomorrow August 5th we're physically off for the 3 hour drive over the Top of the World Highway (supposedly one of the gnarliest roads in the world) to Dawson City, Yukon but our hearts will stay here in AK...one helluva place.
and on your way out of camp, he asks "by the way, Where'd you say you found that feldspar?"
ReplyDeleteYep I'll betcha you're right...as I said I'm a greenhorn that got worked by a sourdough gold panner.
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