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Rebecca Douglas has been to Iceland 29 times. And he has already booked his 30th trip.
The goal of each trip is the same: to photograph the aurora borealis, or northern lights.
Douglas has been photographing this spectacular phenomenon since 2010. Its colors – which can paint the sky a dazzling variety of green, purple, yellow and blue – are the result of particles from the sun reacting with gases in the upper atmosphere of the Earth. With the current solar cycle reaching the peak of its 11-year period, the lights are expected to be even more prominent during the next four years.
Douglas, a professional photographer based in Kent in the UK, he also travels annually to Finland, Norway and Iceland to shoot the night sky. But she said she was also able to photograph the northern lights from the English countryside last year.
The rise of “nocturnism”
Douglas has unknowingly been an early adopter of “nocturnism” – a trend that focuses on nighttime travel experiences.
Booking.com called it a the top travel trend for 2025Describing it as a desire to “ditch the daylight folles for midnight magic”. A global survey of more than 27,000 travelers by the company showed almost two in three travelers say they have considered “darker sky destinations” for activities such as stargazing (72%), cosmic events once in life (59%) and trace constellations (57%).
The Northern Lights, as seen on Rebecca Douglas’ holiday accommodation in Lofoten, an archipelago in Norway.
Source: Rebecca Douglas Photography
Most activities involve the night sky, but others take place on the ground, from city tours and truffle hunting in Italy by night to full moon picnics by the sea.
Luxury travel company Wayfairer Travel said that nocturnism experiences have increased by 25% in the past year, with requests for viewing the Northern Lights in Norway and Iceland, but also for night diving in the Australia’s Great Barrier Reef and Egypt’s Red Sea. Night wildlife safaris in Zambia and Kenya and stargazing in the Atacama Desert in Chile are also popular, according to the company.
“Noctotourism will transform travel in 2025, as night owl travelers are increasingly looking for unique experiences after dark,” said the company’s CEO, Jay Stevens.
Travelers can sign up to hunt truffles at night alongside professional hunters and their dogs.
Stefano Guidi Getty Images News | Getty Images
Eclipse hunting could become a new “bucket list” experience, according to luxury travel operator Scott Dunn.
“Travellers are venturing to remote corners of the world to witness these celestial spectacles, with the High Arctic of Greenland … set to be the next destination to visit thanks to its remote, light-pollution-free coasts,” he said a spokesman for Scott Dunn.
But trips don’t have to be so far, with hotels from Hawaii to Austria now offering stargazing activities. The next total lunar eclipse will be on March 14 and will be visible in much of the worldincluding the Americas, Western Europe and West Africa, according to NASA.
Looking for darkness
Douglas avoids hotel packages, preferring to plan her own trips, as she plans many activities at night. She also said she prefers to stay away from large groups, which often consist of people new to nocturnism who unintentionally create light pollution with their smartphones and camera flashes.
The Northern Lights, seen from Iceland.
Source: Rebecca Douglas Photography
Douglas plans most of his trips around the best time to see the northern lights — usually between August and April, he said. She also chooses remote accommodations far from cities and even neighbors, since a single road or domestic light can compromise photos, she said.
“I spend a lot of time looking for accommodation on Google Maps,” he said. “If there’s a light in the pictures, I’ll ask the host if it’s possible to turn off the outside lighting…Even some of the less active shows can be really beautiful if you’re in a really dark area.”
She also considers the phases of the moon, she said.
An aurora storm seen from Elmley Nature Reserve in Kent, UK.
Source: Rebecca Douglas Photography
“In these two weeks around a new moon, you have the darkest sky possible. And then it’s not only the Aurora that is at its best, but the stars are just amazing,” he said. “You can see the Milky Way, and it’s just this rainbow of dust and sparkle in the sky.”
Douglas created a online course to help people photograph the northern lights.
At night, he also photographs noctilucent clouds — clouds of glittering ice crystals located high in the atmosphere — and polar stratospheric rainbow clouds, he said. Sometimes it shoots from 8 o’clock in the evening to 5 o’clock in the evening, and it has been outside in temperatures at 5 degrees Fahrenheit.
“They say you have to work hard for your art,” Douglas said.
But for her, spending her travels taking pictures at night is “a privilege,” she said.
