Best Places to See the Northern Lights in March

Taking place in late March, the annual Festival of the North is a 10-day festival for towns and villages across Russia's' remote Kola Peninsula, located at 69 degrees north. The line-up of events includes reindeer-sled races, ski marathons, ice hockey, and snowmobile contests, and it's followed by the Murmansk Ski Marathon, held on the first Sunday in April.

Ever built a snow castle? If not, come to Snow King's Winter Festival, an annual celebration of all things snow, ice, and winter. Now in its 23rd year, it takes place March 30, 2018 in Yellowknife — the capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories, which lie at 62 degrees North latitude.

It can be bitterly cold during the winter, but Saariselkä, at 68 degrees north in Finnish Lapland, starts to thaw in March. Nightly aurora borealis hunting by mini-bus begins at 8:00 p.m., while your days are filled with skiing, ice-fishing, snowmobile rides to Raja-Jooseppi, on the Russian border.

The Iceland Winter Games (IWG) return to Akureyri, in northern Iceland, for the fifth year in a row. The competitions, which include ski and snowboard competitions, as well as Icelandic dog sledding championships, run from March 24 to 27. When evening falls, head out of the city for your best chances of seeing the Northern Lights. 

Have you ever traveled on an ice road? The frozen Mackenzie River, in the Northwest territories of Canada, stretches from Inuvik to the Beaufort Sea and over to Tuktoyaktuk (an Inuvialuit village on the Arctic Ocean). It's one of the world's longest ice roads, and it's best traversed from February through mid-April.

Departures through March are available for this trip to glimpse 'ice-cap auroras' at Kangerlussuaq, a tiny community on the west coast of Greenland. Here at 67 degrees north latitude, where skies are said to be clearer than anywhere else in the Arctic Circle, you can spend three days seeking musk oxen and herds of reindeer — and three nights aurora-hunting.

If waiting patiently for the skies to clear doesn't give you the workout you wanted, get to Jokkmokk, in Swedish Lapland, on March 24. This is when the Red Bull Nordenskiöldsloppet begins. This 137-mile race dates back to 1884, and remains the world's longest ski run.

First held in Inari in 1959, the annual Reindeer Championships from March 31 to April 1 will see racers on skis behind their reindeer competing in heats, and a final on Sunday to crown the Champion of Finland.

Late March is the last chance of the year to go on a guided Northern Lights-spotting hike through Sweden's wild Abisko National Park, at 68 degrees north latitude. For four hours, travelers will walk along the Abisko River, using only a hand-held oil lamp on your way to a campfire where coffee and dried reindeer meat will be waiting for you. (And with any luck, the Northern Lights.)

The capital of Finnish Lapland, Rovaniemi (at 66 degrees north) often sees the Northern Lights. On March 23, it's also home to the Rovaniemi Reindeer Sprint Race, which takes place at 6:00 p.m. on Koskikatu Street in the city center. It's a knockout between teams consisting of two reindeer and a skier, with the winning pair of reindeer then facing-off for the crown.

While you're waiting for darkness to fall, why not spend the day in Russia? On March 1, a fjord cruise will welcome passengers in Longyearbyen (in Svalbard, Norway), before traveling to the Esmark Glacier and Barentsburg, in Russia. Lunch features marinated whale meat, baked salmon, and pork rib. After dark, all eyes will turn upward to see the Northern Lights.

With the gradually increasing temperatures of March, outdoor activities become more relaxed. So how about a candle-lit dinner on a frozen arctic sea? Pine Bay Lodge, in Gussövägen, near Luleå (65 degrees north) has cozy mobile Aurora Hideaway restaurants complete with roaring fires.

March 25 is your last chance to join the Northern Lights photo tour in Kiruna, in Swedish Lapland. The hunt begins at 8:00 p.m. and goes until 1:00 in the morning, if necessary. Warm boots, windproof pants, and a cozy cape will be provided, as well as all photography equipment. Just bring your personal SD card.

If you've got kids with you, waiting patiently outdoors for the Northern Lights probably isn't an option. So put them in a SnowCastle made from frozen seawater. This seasonal construction of ice and snow, near Kemi's city center, is open from the end of January until mid-April, and includes a SnowRestaurant, SnowChapel, and a SnowHotel.

It can take a lot of patience to see the Northern Lights, but you don't have to spend all night out in elements waiting for them to appear. At Hotel Rangá, in southern Iceland, guests can be called when the auroras appear — whatever time of night that may be. Some guests might opt to watch the sky from one of the geothermal hot tubs behind the hotel.