Aurora Australis which illuminates the southern sky tends to be more pink, while Northern Lights are mostly green. Don’t take it as a rule tho!

Aurora-service and a KP index

If you want to find out which night is the night I would suggest observing this webside. Aurora-service provides you with viral info about current conditions. However we still do not know how to predict sun’s activity in the future so you can only catch a glimps for 3 days ahead. You can see  there current kp index. The higher it is, the stonger the solar wind, therefore you can see brighter lights and they can be observed further south.

Check the weather conditions first!

Before you leave your cosy, warm apartment and venture to cold, winter night don’t forget to check the cloud coverage in the region. When you are in tourist destinations there will most likely be companies providing some sort of “Aurora Experience”. Prices may vary due to locations and group sizes but they are usually quite high. You can rely on the experience of your guide or try your own luck. It is entirely up to you. Good luck hunthing the Lights!

Vatnajökull National Park

First things first, in order to visit such a magnificent place, you will have to travel around 350 km east from Reykjavik to Vatnajökull National Park which protects (same named) largest glacier in Europe. Renting a car is highly recommended althoug driving conditions can be quite challenging. The other thing is tht you will need a guide in order to safely pay a visit in Ice Castle. We chose Local Guide of Vatnajökull. We were really satisfied with our choice.

Unique experience, every single year!

The meeting point looks abandoned at the first glimpse but later on it turns out to be very cosy and welcoming facility. Our guide was living in this neigbourhood his entire life, just like his father and grandfather before. He had a genuine passion for mountains and had a lot of experience with the  Ice Caves. The thing is they are created during the summer when glacier retreats and the water resulting from melting carves tunnels and halls through Ice. So each year new Ice Caves are created and old ones are destroyed. So each year it is a different, unique experience. In autumn months guides task is to locate and asses newly created caves.

Due to compression and great strenght of a glacial movements Ice in a glacier is deep blue colour. Our pictures do not lie. This is how it looks. Maybe slightly better in a matter of fact.

We had the cave for ourselfs for 30 minutes. It was quite big with couple of big halls and multiple tunnels so with just 8 people in there we had a lot of privacy. Photography opportunities are just incredible, views are stunning, it was definietly the greatest 30 min on Iceland.

Local Guides were also offering a “photography trip” to Ice Cave. In that year, both trips were visiting the same cave but had some more time, inside. We were perfeclty satisfied with our 30 minutes. In some seasons, they will take you to some more distant ones. Be sure to book in advance as they sell out quickly.