Northern Lights
 

My husband and I are thinking about going to Iceland to see the Northern Lights the last week in Dec. through Jan. 2nd. What are the chances we'll see them? Is there a better location? Thanks for the info

Going to Iceland will increase you're odds, but how would anyone know what will happen? Maybe you'll be lucky, maybe not.

See http://wikitravel.org/en/Northern_Lights

My wife and I have kicked around a similar idea thanks to the direct flights from Denver.

Here is a link showing the current aurora forecast and cloud cover in Iceland. Note they are not doing aurora forecasts until September:
http://en.vedur.is/weather/forecasts/aurora/
http://www.northernlightsiceland.com...ghts-forecast/

Here is an official source for world wide aurora forecasts:
http://www.gi.alaska.edu/AuroraForec...ope/2014/07/16

And perhaps more than you ever wanted to know:
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/predict.shtml
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/Aurora/index.html

I have been told that some of the best odds see the lights are in Whitehorse, Canada due to more cloud free days. But now we are talking about seriously cold winter temperatures, and not that much else to do.

Finally, some inspirational photos here:
http://500px.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%...icense_type=-1

The best and most vivid Northern lights I ever saw were on a taxi ride from downtown Jasper (Alberta Canada) out to the HI Hostel about 4 miles out of town. Everyone at the hostel slept through it. Earlier in the week (late October) I was in Churchill Manitoba but they were not active then.
I would not travel to any northern latitude for the sole purpose of seeing Northern Lights.
You can easily spend thousands to see cloudy skies.

<i> > would not travel to any northern latitude for the sole purpose of seeing Northern Lights</i>

Totally agree. At least Iceland has a lot of other cool (no pun intended) stuff to see if you strike out on the lights.

I agree too. That's part of the reason we chose Iceland, if we strike out on the Northern Lights the trip wouldn't be a total waste. Just trying to increase the possibility of seeing them and verifying that Iceland would be the best location at this time of year. Have also heard that Sweden is a good location