Seeking Northern Lights Recommendations

See my post in this thread in the Iceland forum: Northern Lights (the second reply to the post) - it explains some basics about seeing the aurora (anywhere).

Short version: it's always a crap-shoot. With just a few days, your chances of seeing a meaningful display are pretty low. Calibrate your expectations and head to someplace where you will enjoy your trip even if you see nothing but stars (or clouds) when you look up at the night sky (because that's most likely what you'll see). Nature does not tend to cooperate with tightly-scripted plans, and those hoping to see a spectacular sky-show are usually disappointed unless they have a lot of time to kill.

Thanks David! Very helpful. I forgot to clarify though that we leaning more toward Scandinavia/not Iceland, as we all just visited Iceland last summer (and it was spectacular)!

Read Bill Bryson: "Neither Here nor There", 1991. Bryson starts his Eurpean adventure in Hammerfest, Norway hoping to see the Northern Lights. After many cloudy nights.... You get the picture.

If you are still motivated:

https://www.visitnorway.com/things-to-do/nature-attractions/northern-lights/

Between late September and late March, it is dark from early afternoon
until late morning. This is the best time to see the northern lights.

http://www.visitfinland.com/article/doze-off-under-the-northern-lights/

The Northern Lights are visible on roughly 200 nights a year – or every other clear night – in Finnish Lapland.

https://penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/20563/neither-here-nor-there-by-bill-bryson/excerpt

In winter, Hammerfest is a thirty-hour ride by bus from Oslo, though why anyone would want to go there in winter is a question worth considering. It is on the edge of the world, the northernmost town in Europe, as far from London as London is from Tunis, a place of dark and brutal winters, where the sun sinks into the Arctic Ocean in November and does not rise again for ten weeks.

I wanted to see the Northern Lights. Also, I had long harbored a half-formed urge to experience what life was like in such a remote and forbidding place. Sitting at home in England with a glass of whiskey and a book of maps, this had seemed a capital idea. But now as I picked my way through the gray late December slush of Oslo, I was beginning to have my doubts.

https://waitingfornobel.wordpress.com/2013/04/28/neither-here-nor-there-bill-bryson/

Bill Bryson: Well, I had to stay in Hammerfest longer than I planned, overhearing conversations in pubs and on streets in a language I totally didn’t understand, but yes, I finally saw a majestic white light doing a show in the sky. The long stay was really worth it.

So, I'm raining on someone's parade and I really don't like doing that.

I've seen northern lights many, many times. Mostly from an airplane cockpit flying along the northern US. I've seen northern lights from the ground too.

Of the dozens of times I've seen northern lights, only one was spectacular (one night camping when a storm broke in the Canadian Rockies). Mostly, I've seen dim greenish dancing lights. Often, you might not even notice them if you weren't looking.

The reason I say this is I wouldn't advise someone to plan a vacation around northern lights. They only happen occasionally. They are like rain, there's a forecast. Even if they're in the forecast, however, they don't always show up. Even then, they are as likely as not to be a disappointment for someone who made a special trip to see them.

Rather plan a trip you would be happy to do even if there were no northern lights. Give yourself an opportunity to see them if they show up. Have a car, or other way to get out of the city lights and at least a few days in a good area so you have some flexibility.

Thanks Brad! I completely agree. Aside from the Northern Lights, we all do have a great interest in visiting Scandinavia and I'm hoping that this thread will develop to include secondary recommendations :)