These first pics are while landing at Anchorage. *below

AND THEN NIGHT FELL.

OMG Aurora was glorious tonight! I went up to the top of the hill right at the end of our driveway and the progression of the auroral display was just like you see in these photos. These are in order, from the glowy-green diffused cloudy sky, to full on dancing Aurora.

Honestly people - Alaska spoils us for anything remotely resembling the northern lights in the Midwest. I still get excited in Michigan, but....THIS is why we chase the lady Aurora to Alaska!

Also - these are NOT edited at all. This was the color I saw, the shapes, and straight overhead, to the north, to the south, east, and west. I'll probably edit a few of these tomorrow, but most don't need anything at all. I'm beyond happy.

There was one moment when the movement was very intense, fast-moving, overhead - it looked like a hand moving... and it started heading down right toward me. I felt like I could reach out and touch it. Thank the Good Lord for this fantastic show tonight.

The inside of the cabin pics are below.

Below is a series of 3 photos I call "The Road Home" which means my "home" for 15 days!

Murphy Dome is farther away from where we're staying, and larger, at 2877 ft above sea level. There used to be an air force base up here, but the only thing left is a lot of equipment and this observatory; government owned and not open to the public. The land around it tho, at the summit, IS open to the public and is stunning

We drove around a bit - found an airport and the Cheena River, and even saw a few float planes. The airport looked kind of like an old airplane graveyard, but the signs around the airport were so typical of Alaska I had to start taking all the pics.

The two signs below were on the same property's driveway, visible from the street... right near this old airstrip. Oh, Alaska!

Today we slept in a bit (after returning home at 5 am!) When we got up and went out on the deck, this was how we were greeted. A combination of sunshine sunbeams through the yellow trees and fog - made for this perfect shot!

Then, we went exploring - our own personal color tour of Fairbanks and the surrounding area. Drove southeast toward Nenana then west to North Pole.

Alaskan Signs, part 2

During this trip we are noticing a lot of unique signage that seems to be classic Alaska. See yesterday's post for part 1.... here we go on the second part of this crazy sign journey!

We remember this bar from a couple years ago - evidently it's been here forever. If you study ALL the parts of this place, you'll see why I am not posting this on Facebook. I'm thinking I'd be in Facebook jail for obscenity!

Hours and hours this went on. Ok well maybe about 2 1/2 hours. I realize some of these look alike but if you look closely, no two shots are alike. They have differences, nuances, color changes, shape changes, altitude changes, formation changes. I just can't even with this.

It faded to a faint green band on the northern horizon. Below are some shots of this. At home (or in northern Michigan, Wisconsin, or Minnesota) these would be considered FANTASTIC aurora. But up here.... not so much! Jules and I are afraid we're now spoiled forever.

This morning we went adventuring to Olnes Pond, which is about an hour north of Fairbanks in the beautiful hills. It was a stunning drive up and over the mountain, and the pond will make a perfect backdrop, with north facing beach areas for us if we get a clear night in the area.

On the way home we stopped at one of our favorite 'truck' stops, the Hillside Diner.... for PIE of course!

Another stop in Fox, where we filled up Julie's camp water jugs with delicious fresh spring water. The little shack at the left has two spigots that shoot out water really fast from the springs. People come from all around to fill up jugs - most ginormous water jugs! It's delicious and fresh water - everyone should try it at least once! It's free, too!

Beautiful bluebird sky and bright yellow aspen.

The next unique experience - we had water delivered to the huge tank in the basement today. The guy OVERfilled it, and we have a flooded basement. A call to the airbnb host resulted in a 2 hour wait but they came and cleaned up (we did most of that!) and left us fans to help dry it up. WOW. Big mess! It was nice to meet the owners though - and just as we thought, they are lovely people!

Let's recap: we've been here a week, had an earthquake, a typhoon, a flood, and two more earthquakes. We think we'll stay put tonight. :)

Last night's Aurora notes: We went to Olnes Pond which was supposed to be the clearest spot within an hour drive - between 11 and 1 am. Driving there it was clear; once we got there and were waiting for astronomical dark and the aurora data to improve, the clouds rolled in.

Around midnight:

• the solar wind speed was up between 400 and 500; excellent.

• The BZ dropped to negative: excellent.

• The ovation showed right over Fairbanks; excellent.

• BT was over 6; good.

• Hemispheric power was in the teens; fair.

• Density was between 5 and 8; excellent.

These are conditions we'd be excited about even in the upper midwest so - seeing that we're in ALASKA at a latitude of almost 65 °N, we were SURE we'd see our big green friend.

Yet, no aurora. Clouds were partially a factor, but the clouds weren't too dense that we should have seen green behind them. We got home, checked nearby aurora cams, and saw some green on the horizon on Ronn's cam so we tried again. Nada. Checked periodically through the night and had stars - so also took test shots. Nothing. Jules got up in the middle of the night and took some test shots, got a tiny corner of green but no band, no pillars, nothing but a tiny green glow. Why? This is a question for the experts--just written here to discuss with those experts later!

One of us woke up every hour to check the sky and it was an effort made in vain! Clouds and more clouds. Finally clear-ish skies around 5:30 am but alas....no aurora!

One of our potential (and past) night sky photography sites is the bridge at Nenana. Today we stopped there for daylight pics - and a little tour of this very old, cute little town.

Grizzly Bear encounter - NUMBER 1! As we came around a mountain on the 30 mile trek to the "end of the line" in the park, we saw a "bear jam" which means any cars that are in the area will stop if someone spots a bear. It's kind of handy if you're not looking the right direction. There happened to be a Ranger there, and she pointed out the grizzly bear to us on the side of the mountain, foraging for berries. They're getting ready to hibernate, but aren't in their dens yet. He was a HUGE grizzly, just walking slowly snuffling through the bushes. These shots were taken with a maximum zoom on my little Canon with a 1000x zoom.

These mountains tho..... the colors of the trees and the low shrub growth, the mountains, the rocks... just wow. Nothing in the world like Alaska in September.

Denali in September is stunning. After the buses stop for the season, and before the first snow flies, they open up the park to drive the first 30 miles. We've hit this special few days a couple of times now and feel very lucky each time. If you've ever considered coming to Alaska, just do it. In September!

Home now to wait for the Northern Lights to appear! Fingers (and data) crossed!

After we noticed the quick build from photo 2 to photo 3, we knew it would explode overhead next. We ran down the hill and got a great show! There are nuances in each photo that is different from the next. I'll caption important stuff to look for.

Of course, we tried to sleep today! Then dinner at the coolest wood-fired pizza place! Highly recommend! It's on the airport grounds looking over the runway. A bunch of old airplane paraphernalia all over the place. And delicious pizza and salad!

Tonight we go out aurora chasing with the famous Aurora Chasers, Ronn and Marketa. Fingers crossed! If anybody can find a hole in the clouds and a view of the northern lights, it's these lovely folks!

Play the little 10 second time-lapse below. It was taken in an hour's time, but condensed down into a 10 second video. It shows the structure, movement, and highs and lows of the aurora at this latitude. Pure joy!

The next series of photos are of the overhead aurora. Some are taken with a fisheye lens, some are just with my wide-angle.

So many beaver dams!

Both of the pics below were from the Fred Meyer store. The sign on the truck is VERY Alaska.

And the 49th State Brewing company is making some Frontier soda in Pumpkin Pie Soda flavor. Nope - we didn't try it!

The data looked SUPER good for tonight, earlier in the day. Earth weather is still good, but the aurora data is tanking :(

Time will tell.

...aaaannnndddd it stayed tanked. Bummer, after hearing there was a G1 storm predicted for tonight! We went out to our secret spot southwest of Fairbanks, and there she was, a band of green on the horizon. It built to a wider, brighter band, but that was it. Nothing special, and the data supports that right now. Oh well, we're so happy with the last 2 weeks of aurora chasing!

But wait!!!!!

We were ready to sleep and Julie was watching the other webcams in the area. Suddenly she's yelling up the stairs "Libby get down here!"... and the sky exploded.

These little "spurts" of structure in the aurora were interesting to watch. We have very low solar wind speed tonight - between 330-390 km/s, but a negative bz and good hemispheric power. Not sure why the spurts happen but they will last anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes each time.

These last couple (below) were taken around 5:00 am. I think. It's all a blur right now!