My Arctic Circle Story (Ep. 2)

It has been a month since I returned from my trip to Tromso, Northern Norway. I have plenty of photos yet to share, but in this post I would like to share the places I went to.

My first trip into a Scandinavion country. It was exciting!

I started my journey from London, right after I finished with my conference. From Gatwick airport, I took a flight to Oslo above the very cloudy day. It was the same day as the sun eclipse happened, but unfortunately I couldn't see any of the effect from of the window during the two hours flight. 

Another two hours flight from Oslo to Tromso, getting inside the Arctic Circle zone.

After a quick layover at Oslo airport, I then hopped onto a domestic flight to Tromso. It took me another two hours to get there. I purposely booked for a window seat as I don't want to miss a view of how the land at Arctic Circle looks like. Below is one example of many other shots I managed to take from the flight.

Frozen lakes and snowy mountains entertained my eyes throughout my flight from Oslo to Tromso.

It was only end or March and I never thought there were still lots of snow down there and the temperature was still lingering below freezing point. I was slightly worried as I know I didn't bring so much of thick winter clothing except for one sweater and one jacket.

Anyway, I touched down at Tromso airport almost sunset time there. I rented a campervan, and the lady was kind enough to send over the campervan to the airport.

I was more concerned about the new place I just arrived and didn't have much clue about where to go or where to sleep later, but the lady's main concern can be summarized with this simple question, "Can you drive manual gear?"

Not wanting to make her worry about her brand new Volkswagen campervan (yes, I was the first person to rent this particular one), I had no other choice but to affirm her that I can drive manual car even with one eye closed. Ha ha ha.. (that's true anyway).

Her last words to me as I took the key from her was "Be adventurous, and keep exploring. I'll see you again at this airport in few days time".

And that's how my journey in Tromso began.

Places I went to: Tromvik, Ersfjordbotn, Sommaroy, Skibotn, and Finland border.

I didn't really do much in-depth research about the places I wanted to go. It was more driven by what I wanted to see. Three things made me want to come to Tromso:

1) Based on Wiki, Tromso is listed among the top ten best places on earth to look for Aurora Borealis. Wiki also said Tromso is an expensive place to go - yeah, no doubt about it. I was hunting for the Northern Lights each and every day I was there.

2) Tromso also has a few beautiful fjords nearby worth going to and only requires short drive (1-2 hours).

3) Like many other places in Northern Norway, Tromso is also a place where you may be able to see whales at the fjords - if you come at the right season.

I made my plans based on these three things I wanted to see. As you can see on the map above, I named the places I went to. The following places may not necessarily be in any kind of order, but the places I went to are:

How it looks from Google Earth apps.

Ersfjordbotn is a very small village by a fjord. Even with Google Earth you can imagine how beautiful it may look in the real life. Prior to coming to Tromso, when I searched for the best places to photograph the Aurora, Ersfjordbotn is listed as one of the best spot.

And yes, I would say this place is beautiful not only when you can see Aurora at night, but it is also beautiful during daytime.

Ersfjordbotn: I would say this is my favourite spot throughout my trip. Beautiful by day time, even more pretty at night with the dancing Northern Lights show.

I went to Ersfjordbotn on the next day after arriving Tromso to take a look, and managed to do some self potrait shots. Too bad the day was overcast, or else a blue sky would make this picture looks much better.

I went again to Ersfjordbotn a few nights later when the sky was predicted to be clear, to shoot the Aurora Borealis (I will share the pictures on another post, with some tips based on my experience).

Tromvik is a very small fishing village with only about 50 houses. I was hoping to see some whales at the fjord there, but I came a bit too late for their feeding season.

Next, I also made a short drive (around 1 hour) to go to a very small fishing village, Tromvik. On one blog I read, this guy managed to see a group of whales coming up to the surface at the fjord as he was driving towards Tromvik.

I stopped by the roadside at the fjord every now and then, and spent few minutes each time to spot for whales. Luck was not on my side. Later on when I was talking to a local, they said the whales have left the area since February when the feeding season has ended. Too bad I came a bit too late.

However, the drive towards Tromvik was fun and the view was fascinating. I departed from Tromso town very early in the morning, hence I managed to get some good sunrise view by one of the lakes there.

I drove East-wards into Sommaroy. The view by the roadside towards Sommaroy from Tromso was beautiful and I saw many people ski-ing up the mountains.

I also went to Sommaroy. Many tourists mentioned that this is another good place to visit in Tromso. I can't say much about it because the two times I went to Sommaroy, weather was not on my side. It was super cloudy and super snowy when I went there, hence I didn't have any chance to take many good pictures, and it was a bit disappointing that I couldn't see any Aurora Borealis from this little island or else I'm sure it would be great because this island is very dark and suitable for viewing the Aurora.

I spent one night sleeping inside my campervan at the yellow X mark on the map above. It was snowing quite a lot and pretty cold. My night ended early that day.

The next morning after spending the night at Sommaroy beach. I parked the campervan nearby this very small camping site with simple toilet facility.

From Tromso, I drove southwards to Skibotn. And the next morning, I drove further south into Finland!

I practically was hunting for Aurora Borealis each and every night I was there. One of the day, after a short discussion with the guide at Tromso's visitors centre, he suggested me to drive down south towards the Finland border to a place named Skibotn to look for it.

So, I drove down south for almost two hours to reach a small camping site. I actually met another tour van who was also on their way to Skibotn, so the guide was kind enough to let me follow them for their Aurora hunting.

Upon reaching the camping site, that was the very first time in my life where I see the amazing Northern Lights with my own two eyes. It was truly amazing, beyond words. I find it hard to explain with words, but I can still remember the moment very clearly in my mind even until today.

The show that night was not long, as the sky was quickly being covered by thick coulds. We made our way home after 1.5hours there, and it was already almost midnight.

While the tour group disappeared in the dark with their van back to Tromso city center, I was clueless of where to sleep for the night. I initially thought of looking for a petrol station at Skibotn but it did not open 24 hours, including the toilet. So, I drove in another direction and shortly I found a truck stop area where there were a toilet facility with running tap water, and I saw another campervan there so I thought it might be a good place to sleep for the night.

I arrived at this site at midnight to sleep without knowing how the surrounding looks like. The next morning, woke up to this beautiful view of mountains covered with snow.

This truck stop site is at Oteren, and I woke up to this view of snowy mountains.

Weather forecast was showing a very cloudy day with lots of snow that whole day. I initially made a plan to drive to Senja, another place famous for having many beautiful fjords. But I cancelled my plan due to the thick snow.

So, instead of heading west towards Senja, I drove further down towards Finland border. It was still snowing very heavily however I somehow like the experience of driving in the heavy snow. I was also actually looking for a better spot to look for Aurora at night, but too bad the whole day and night was forcasted to be covered with thick cloud all around the area.

Reaching the Norway-Finland border on the famous E8 road.

I drove further ahead into Finland for another half an hour before making a turn back at the first petrol station I met. That was the furtherst I drove throughout my whole trip.

I then made my self back to Tromso town centre and just explored the nearby places while waiting for the sky to clear at night to hunt for more Aurora Borealis.

That's all I can share about the places I went to. I may write more about other things in another posts, like how to hunt for the Aurora Borealis and how to photograph it. Stay tuned!