Thursday, August 05, 2010

4 am in the neighborhood

Update: I did get up at 4 am, and spent a half an hour trying to find an ideal lookout site. The city lights (see prior post) are pretty bright, there was a crescent moon, and Neighborhood Watch has had great success at encouraging everyone to have a glaringly bright light turning on outside all night long.

I travel up Mill Creek Canyon; it didn't take long for me to realize that an East-West canyon floor means the North-South views are blocked.

Since I was traveling in my pajamas, I was hesitant about parking where a helpful soul or "LEO" might pull up and ask if I needed help. (LEO: that's shorthand for Law Enforcement Officer, I picked that up from watching NCIS. Who says you can't learn anything from prime time television?)

Anyway, it was a lovely early morning for a little drive. No, not a bit of green or red Northern Light to be seen. I really stared hard to the north before finally deciding that even if I did see a faint hue, I really want the National Geographic/Weather Channel/Google Picture kind of Northern Lights display to be the kind that gets seeing Northern Lights checked off my bucket list. Plus I think they probably are even more amazing when seen hovering over a snow field.

Back to saving for a once in a life time trip someday!

Unless, of course, NASA is right and the sun is going to be burping up some hum-dingers solar flares in 2011-2013. If they are right about that happening, then quite possibly Northern Lights may become so common that people will be ignoring them like they so often ignore sunsets nowadays.

2 comments:

Judy said...

I'm smiling as I picture you cruising the neighbourhood in your pj's...looking for a light show. Sorry it wasn't what you hoped for!

Sara at Come Away With Me said...

Isn't Iceland (or is it Greenland?) the place to go to see the Northern Lights? That would be a fabulous trip for you and B one of these days.