
“You don’t need a dark sky park,” he said, but “anywhere dark in the countryside will work.” Rodney Cortwright, an astronomer at the park, said that on some nights hundreds of spectators flock to the park to see the lights. Half a dozen miles of trails have signs that direct visitors – using flashlights with red lenses to preserve the night – at stations to look at the skies. Limited accommodation is available on site, but the park is open 24 hours a day with no admission fee.
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As a certified Dark Sky Park, Headland is known for its starry nights, and offers free visitor programs and astronomical event events at the Waterfront Center and Observatory. Several miles west of McKinlaw City in northern Michigan, Headlands International Dark Sky Park sits on 600 acres of old-growth forest on Lake Michigan. Along with cottages and other accommodation options, the eclectic and outdoor Shelburne Museum (with works by Andrew Wyeth, Winslow Homer and Grandma Moses) is 15 miles to the south, while the temptation to sample the wares at Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream Factory (35 miles down Interstate 89 in Waterbury) may prove hard to resist. The 4-mile-long, 10-foot-wide Causeway Trail provides a spectacular and dark vantage point from which to walk over the lake.

And if the northern lights are out, the reflections from the vast ice surface will be unforgettable. Green Mountain, 10 miles north of Causeway Park, Burlington, Vermont and along Lake Champlain, can offer one of Vermont’s best dark sky vistas, even in frozen waters, with spectacular sunsets. Overnight guests can participate in guided hikes or borrow any necessary equipment, such as packs or snowshoes.

A less expensive option with potential hiking and snowshoeing approaches to Aurora can be found 4 miles south on Route 302 at the Appalachian Mountain Club’s Highland Center.
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Several thousand feet below the summit, Bretton Woods offers a number of day activities, including downhill skiing, snow tubing, 60 miles of cross-country trails, guided backcountry skiing, a zip line, and a thick to take a spin until mid-April. “On the opposite side of things, the shortest was about five minutes.” His experiences were mainly of standing in the valleys below, as the sky at the observatory can be cloudy. “I’ve seen performances from sunset to sunrise,” he said.

Ryan Knapp, a meteorologist at Mount Washington Observatory, a scientific and educational nonprofit atop that peak, has seen the northern lights nearly three dozen times over the past 15 years.
