Faint Hopes

In the last couple of years, I’ve missed multiple opportunities to photograph the northern lights from the Bay Area. Until recently, I wouldn’t have thought it was possible to capture the aurora borealis from this far south. But I learned that the Sun has been entering its solar maximum, the most active phase of its natural 11-year cycle, when changes in its magnetic field produce more frequent and energetic solar storms. While this increase in activity was expected, the strength of some recent storms, combined with how directly they’ve been aimed at Earth, has occasionally pushed auroral visibility to much lower latitudes than usual.

A while ago, I wrote about one of those missed chances. This was followed by a later event, stronger and even more visible, that I couldn’t photograph due to dad duties. Don’t get me wrong, I was very happy to play that role, but as images poured into my news feed, I felt a little jealous. So, when I heard that another potential event was possible, I made the effort to get out and see what I could capture.

I met my friend Ryan at China Camp State Park, a location not too far from the bright lights of San Francisco, but just dark enough to offer some hope. We headed toward an attractive location (if not attractively named), Rat Rock Island, and climbed down to the shoreline. It was low tide, a new moon, and the sky was clear. Conditions were about as good as they could be. All we needed was some color.

We set up our cameras in the dark, manually focusing and trying not to slip on the rocks. It was slow, careful work. Then we waited in the cold. I passed the time photographing the landscape under a sky full of stars. I liked what I was getting, but looking overhead, I couldn’t make out any hint of color with my own eyes.

As it got late, clouds began drifting in and a boat entered the scene, making it harder to isolate the island as a focal point. We kept checking online space weather data (which I still struggle to understand) and while there was some hope, it seemed like it could take hours. Eventually, I decided to call it.

The next day was full of meetings, and I didn’t get a chance to look at my photos until late that night, when I imported them into Lightroom. To my surprise, there it was: a faint red glow in the sky. This wasn’t the dramatic display you see in Alaska or Norway, but the aurora had been there all along, just below the threshold of my vision. On this occasion, the camera picked up what my eyes couldn’t.

I don’t consider this a box fully checked. I still want to witness an aurora with my own eyes, preferably in my home state. But for now, this was a deeply satisfying, if somewhat unexpected outcome.

“the aurora had been there all along, just below the threshold of my vision”