Aurora Borealis over Cape Cod

November 11th will go down in my memory as one of the most exciting and awe-inspiring nights of my life. I was coming back from a dinner off-Cape and knew there was a chance of the aurora being visible. I couldn’t see anything on the drive but when I got home my Threads feed was full of people raving about seeing the aurora around Boston. I stepped out onto my porch and took a night mode iPhone shot to the north and could see a pink and purple glow on the horizon.

I grabbed my camera bag and ran out the door to drive towards Millway Beach in Barnstable - the closest north-facing beach to my house. Later, I would regret not grabbing my second camera battery, a coat, gloves, and a hat. Live and learn.

Down at Millway there were a bunch of cars parked with people out and in the cars looking for the aurora. It was visible in the sky over head as a faint milky glow with maybe a touch of green and purple here and there. There were a ton of people with their headlights on so I left Millway and drove farther down Route 6A to a small parking lot I knew with Sandy Neck Lighthouse more directly to the north. There were less people, less headlights, and a more direct show of the lighthouse and I stayed at this spot for about an hour jumping in and out of my car to try and warm up because it was freezing with a strong wind.

+At this point my camera battery was almost dead (remember how I didn’t grab my second battery) and I was freezing. I checked my aurora forecasting app - thanks to Autumn Schrock for the recommendation and excellent blog post on photographing the aurora - and saw that the current substorm was dying down and there was supposed to be a stronger storm in about an hour. I almost turned around and drove home but I’m so glad I decided to head out to the National Seashore instead.

I cranked up the heat and plugged my camera in to charge and drove out to Nauset Lighthouse at first, hoping for a lighthouse aurora photo. The beacon on the light was strobing out regularly and the aurora wasn’t that bright yet so I got back in the car and drove south towards Coast Guard Beach. I circled the parking lot and still no bright aurora. I was heading back home when the sky visible glowed brilliant red. I quickly pulled over, shut off my car and all of it’s lights, and ran down the beach path to where the fencing ended at the dune line. And holy cow did the aurora come out.

I’ve been to Iceland and seen the aurora there and this display was brighter, more mobile, and simply put more awe inspiring. I’m usually pretty focused on my camera when I’m out taking pictures but multiple times I simply stood back and said WOW out loud as a huge band of green glow arced from horizon to horizon while several groups of red pillars danced in the sky overhead. I’ve actually pulled down the saturation and brightness in the above photo to try to match what I saw with my eyes as best as possible. It was that bright and colorful.

This photo was taken around 11:30pm and I didn’t get home until almost 1am after I finally got too cold to stay outside any longer.