Tromsø, Norway: Northern Lights Dream

Visited Feb. 16-21, 2024

Do you see the smiley face in the lights?

“I was full of gratitude that everything in my life aligned so I could be present in that moment, to see these beams from the sun perfectly dance in the sky.”

The idea of visiting the arctic circle in February was scary, exciting, and so unknown to me. Having never been as far north as Tromsø, I expected it to be so cold that I had visions of frostbite, and that I would enter a whole different world once crossing that invisible arctic circle line.

Tromsø was a lively city with a lot to do and friendly locals. This island has amazing views, easy transportation, and will make you want to cozy up with a cup of coffee and a pastry.

Since I am trying to cross experiences off my bucket list, this trip was primarily planned so we could see the Northern Lights.

This is how I thought of it:

Northern Lights = Ideal location (Tromsø) + Ideal month (February).

Makes sense, right? Everything else (the cold, the insane prices) was secondary, since I was convinced we would see the infamous Aurora Borealis.

A few key things about Tromsø:

It is very expensive
You must try Waffles with Brown Cheese
Bars are open late, but food is not served late
Lots of snow- trust the drivers or be extremely confident in your own driving if renting a car
The Grocery store will be your friend
Merino wool is important

Public Transportation: Even though Tromsø’s airport is tiny, there are decent transportation options to get to the city center. Right outside the airport doors, you will see convenient and nice buses that take you to the city center, but they are really expensive, especially when there is a city bus for $2 that picks you up just across the street. We hopped on a city bus, which took about 20 minutes to take us to our stop, Peder Hansens Gate. If the bus isn’t your cup of tea, there were many taxis available, too.

Hotel: Enter Viking. Since there were 5 of us, we needed a place with enough space, still somewhat affordable, and we wanted a front desk. This hotel has multiple locations, but we were in one that felt like an apartment. The absolute best part about this Hotel was the free coffee, tea, and cookies 24/7. I know my priorities seem off here, but when you need to stay up all night chasing the northern lights, coffee is a must!

Do I need cash?: It is always a good idea to have cash, but everywhere we went took card, so we didn’t stress about it, or use cash a single time.

Now to the good stuff, the dreamy 4 night Tromsø itinerary:

Day 1: Arrive in Tromsø; Burgerman; Misfit Bar; ølhallen

There are only a few direct flights from Europe to Tromsø, so most likely, your flight will have a layover in Oslo. When we arrived from Frankfurt to Oslo, we had to go back through security because, as the airport worker stated, an airline that flew us (Lufthansa) here does not have a security agreement with the airline that is flying us to Tromsø (SAS). Odd right?

Burgerman

Since our arrival into Tromsø was late, Burgerman was one of the only options left for food. This was surprising to us as it was a Friday night and many places were still open, but only for drinks. I actually picked up a falafel sandwich from the grocery store for dinner, but the rest of my group ate burgers.

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Misfit Bar

Drinking Hawaiian cocktails while the snow it piling up outside? Fun experience here.

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ølhallen

A must visit place, øhallen had a variety of beers and ciders to choose from. It looked exactly how I would expect a bar in Norway to look, complete with a polar bear inside. I loved the beer glasses so much that I bought a few ($5 each) from the Mack store next door.

Day 2: Harbor, Cafe, Shopping, Northern Lights Big Bus Tour

Harbor

Since the sun was out and it stopped snowing, we walked to the harbor for views of the other side of Tromsø, the water, and the boats. With our free coffee from our hotel, of course.

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Smortorget Cafe

After soaking up the sun, it was time for brunch at Smortorget Cafe. The coffee and pastries were excellent. I even ordered a homemade quesadilla, which was delicious. We sipped on our coffee while watching the snow add another foot to the ground.

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Shopping

I already stated that the grocery store was our best friend and everything was expensive in Tromsø. So, we bought a few packs of local beer from the store and relaxed at our hotel before going on a big Northern Lights chase.

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Northern Lights Big Bus Chase Tour

This tour is one of the highest ranked chasing tours, and I can understand why. I was skeptical at first because 1. there are so many people on the tour since it is a big bus, and 2. this tour didn’t provide snow suits (I wasn’t sure if I was dressed appropriately for the weather that was going to hit in the middle of the night.) It was my favorite part of my time in Tromsø.

(What to wear/bring: Merino wool base layers are so important for cold weather! If you buy a high quality set, it will provide warmth without being itchy, and it takes a lot to make them smell bad. Wear lots of layers, even multiple layers of wool socks. Bring hand and foot warmers!)

What conditions are necessary to see the Northern Lights?:

Clear Sky
Dark Sky
Geomagnetic Activity – aka, you need to be lucky.

I didn’t have my hopes up for seeing the lights since it was snowing SO much in Tromsø. The sky was so cloudy. And the moon was so bright. BUT, I do consider myself lucky.

Sometimes the lights can be visible in Tromsø, like from the cable car station or just while walking around the city. However, most Northern Lights chasing tours promise that they will go “as far as Finland” to see the lights. So, we drove almost 4 hours from Tromsø in multiple feet of snow (I could NEVER drive in that kind of weather) into Finland where the sky was clear, with lights peaking through the clouds on our way to park the bus.

There the Northern Lights were, giving us an amazing show.

one of my favorite pictures from the night!

this was taken on an iPhone. You can clearly tell the difference between iPhone and professional camera!

We had extremely strong overhead aurora. This c shaped aurora (corona) was a result of that:

The Green Lady even started dancing!

It was truly a beautiful and humbling experience.

I wasn’t sure what my emotions would exactly be when I saw the lights for the first time. Part of me thought I might cry. I was full of gratitude that everything in my life aligned so I could be there in that moment, to see these beams of sun perfectly dance in the sky.

This tour provided hot juice, cookies, a fire, and a lot of information and stories about the northern lights. We learned that different regions have different ideas of what the lights mean.

There is so much to learn about the Northern Lights that I had no idea about and still don’t fully understand. But, in a summary, there can be different colors because of 1. what chemical light is reacting with and 2. intensity of the aurora (higher intensity would change colors from green to red).

The Sami people believed the Northern Lights were the souls of their ancestors.

My favorite story told by the guides was how Finnish people came to understand the meaning behind the Northern Lights, since we were in Finland! In summary – the Aurora is a fire fox dancing across the sky. The fox wanted to join the other animals in the sky, shown as constellations. The fox, however, didn’t get to be a constellation, but regardless, was so excited to be reunited with its animal friends that he ran to see all of the animals. So, the fire fox came to be, dancing across the sky to create the Northern Lights.

We arrived back to our hotel at 0330.

P.S. Most of the Northern Lights chasing tours communicate with each other about where the aurora is the strongest. So, your experience will really just differ based on what the tour guides provide in terms of food, clothing, etc.

Day 3: Fjord boat ride, Shopping, Walk across Trømso bridge, Arctic Cathedral, Cable Car, Dinner, Huken Brygg

Fjord boat ride

Since our sleep schedule was messed up, we wanted a relaxing morning. The Fjord boat ride was exactly that, and I loved every second of it. Not only was the boat smooth and comfortable, but it was sunny and a beautiful day for a boat ride.

We went through fjords, past fishing villages, and even saw a wild reindeer.

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Shopping

This is a different kind of shopping from the previous day! Yesterday was for groceries, while this shopping is for fun! Tromso has some of the most unique shopping I’ve seen. The Sami stores give such interesting glimpses of how the Sami people live! Some stores even have samples of whale, moose, and reindeer to taste.

Part of the shopping experience that I loved most was just walking around to see the buildings architecture. It is so beautiful and distinct, especially with snow surrounding them.

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Walk across the Tromsø Bridge:

There is a walking path on one side of the bridge and a bike path on the other. The walk took about 20 minutes, but it felt like a further distance than I expected it to be to walk across, but the views and the experience made up for it. Being above the water made me appreciate how clean and clear their water is, making more sense why they claim to have the best drinking water in the world!

At the end of the bridge you are met with the iconic Arctic Cathedral. There is an entry fee, so we just looked through the glass windows to see in. I was intrigued by the stained glass designs on the outside of the church.

Walk to the Fjellheisen cable car:

We walked from the Arctic Cathedral to the Cable Car Station. This cable car is a top thing to do at night, only if you have a clear night and a good chance to see the Northern Lights. We opted to not ride up the cable car since the price was $30 per person and it was so cloudy that we wouldn’t have seen anything. However, if it would have been a clear day, we were going to ride up and have a few drinks at the cafe up there.

We took the bus back to the city center.

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Dinner at La Famiglia for pizza

If a restaurant puts either pear or hot honey on pizza, I have to try it, because they probably have great taste for mixing flavors. The pizza shown below is their pear & gorgonzola pizza. Delicious!

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Huke Brygg for cocktails

Beers in the hotel before going to Huke Brygg for cocktails. It was classy and fun in here, so I would recommend going!

Day 4: Kaffebonna, Thrift Shopping, Sami Reindeer Feeding Tour, Northern Lights Small Group Tour

Kaffebonna

Kaffebonna was a must this morning for delicious black coffee. We ordered waffles and brown cheese here, but I would just stick to their coffee if you want the best experience. Our hotel had a free waffle making station with brown cheese and jam that was much better than here.

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Thrift Shopping

We had some extra time between the cafe and our next tour, so we went to a few shops. My new favorite shop was Tromsø’s thrift store, UFF Secondhand. There were so many high quality but affordable wool sweaters, coats, purses, and shoes. If I had more room in my suitcase, there would have been a lot more coming home with me.

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Sami Reindeer Feeding Tour

This is one of the top activities to do in Tromsø, and for good reason. It is an actual, real life, working reindeer farm, and we fed those reindeer.

The reindeer eat from buckets that you can hold, so they get very up close and personal with you. They are gentle, so we didn’t have any issues!

We learned a lot about Sami culture, and even warmed up in their traditional tents with fire. After feeding the reindeer, they fed us reindeer soup, which is a traditional soup in their culture (and commonly served at their weddings)!

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Northern Lights Small Group Tour

This was our second Northern Lights tour for the trip. It wasn’t totally necessary because we had such an amazing show the first night, but we wanted to experience the snow suits and have a meal outside by the fire, since we didn’t have that with the big bus tour.

The weather was still cloudy and snowy in Tromsø, so we went to the same area in Finland to see the lights. They made an appearance, but not anywhere close to the first night.

The snow suits were really warm, so warm that I didn’t even have my winter coat on under! The temperatures actually got down to negative F!

Day 5: Fly to Malaga

A logical next stop on your itinerary would be Bergen, Oslo, Helsinki, Tallinn, Stockholm, etc. We weren’t sure if we would be able to tolerate any more cold weather, so we decided to go from the north of Europe, to the very south to escape the cold.

Happy travels!

GRAB GELATO & GO