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\nA chance encounter with the aurora borealis sparked Dennis Lehtonen’s journey to becoming a full-time northern lights chaserHis experiences highlight everything from mystical folklore to the patience of aurora watching demandsLehtonen ensures that you don’t need expensive equipment or extensive expertise to capture images of the Northern Lights<\/p>\n
The northern lights are one of Mother Nature’s greatest gifts. Rare and elusive, their otherworldly glow makes witnessing the aurora borealis<\/a> feel like a once-in-a-lifetime encounter.\n<\/p>\n The first time Dennis Lehtonen<\/a>, Finnish photographer and aurora chaser, caught a glimpse of the northern lights, it wasn’t on his bucket list. He had been visiting an observatory in Helsinki in 2018 when he stepped outside and caught a green, shimmery ribbon of light dancing across the night sky.\n<\/p>\n \u201cTo me, it was an amazing experience. It was absolutely magical. I had never seen them before,\u201d Lehtonen tells PEOPLE exclusively.\n<\/p>\n Aurora Borealis Hunter Shares What He’s Learned After Years of Chasing the Northern Lights.<\/p>\n Dennis Lehtonen\/Instagram<\/p>\n At that point in time, Lehtonen was \u201cobsessed with space\u201d and \u201cvery passionate about the stars,\u201d so seeing the aurora felt like a natural extension of his interests and compelled him to quit his university to continue fulfilling his hobby.\n<\/p>\n Lehtonen then realized Helsinki wasn\u2019t the right place for his passion. It was too far north for photographing planets<\/a> and too far south for reliably seeing the northern lights<\/a>, making it a challenging location for sky-related observation or photography.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I had three options, and one of them was farther north. I chose that one because it gave me a better chance of seeing the northern lights,” he says.\n<\/p>\n “This was during the pandemic in 2020 \u2013 it was a new city, I didn\u2019t know anyone and it wasn\u2019t a very fun time. I spent my days studying and in my free time, I would climb up a water tower where there was another observatory. Sometimes you could even see the northern lights over the city, which made it a better location for my hobby.”<\/p>\n From there, Lehtonen made his way to small, remote villages in the far north. He worked basic jobs to get by, but his free time was spent in the wilderness, often at midnight, waiting for the northern lights to appear. That became his way of life for the next three years.<\/p>\n One of his most memorable experiences with the northern lights ties back to an old Finnish legend. \u201cIn Finland, we actually believe the northern lights are created by a fox,\u201d he explains. In fact, the Finnish word for aurora is revontulet, which translates to \u201cfox fires.\u201d<\/p>\n According to folklore, a magical fox runs across the snowy wilderness of Lapland, and as its tail brushes against the snowflakes, sparks fly into the sky, creating the lights.<\/p>\n