To see the atmospheric phenomenon known as the northern lights or the aurora borealis would be an amazing experience, for sure. I have always heard of people having to travel to Alaska or somewhere else to see it. I’ve seen awesome photos of it and I certainly would love to see it in person someday.

Then something amazing happened. Due to a solar storm, the northern lights became visible to the U.S. over the weekend. I’ve heard of it being visible in the northern parts of the country before but this one was totally different. It was visible down south as well.

The northern lights are something we’re not accustomed to seeing here in North Carolina because we’re too far south. Thing is, the hubs and I still didn’t get to see it because it was cloudy on Friday night and we were already in bed on Saturday night. It was visible between midnight to 2:00 a.m. on Saturday and my bed was already calling my name. But here are some photos taken by the locals around Western North Carolina.

And the photos below were courtesy of my good friend, Aimee. She is a friend since college and she is now living in Michigan.

Apparently, the colors were not as vibrant as the colors in these photos if you just look at them with the naked eye. You have to use your cellphone, set it to night shift and do some adjustments before you can capture those colors. It didn’t make sense to me at first because I thought you would see the northern lights clearly and vividly with your eyes.

I may not have seen it, but I’m still glad that a lot of people here in the U.S. got to enjoy this once-in-a-lifetime experience.

How about you? Did you see the northern lights?