Country diary: The northern lights have reached us, down in the valley | Astronomy

It’s a calm, clear evening at last after two days of relentless wind and rain. When my son phones to tell me to look outside I’m hoping that I’ll see the northern lights. Piling on layers of warm clothes – the temperature is already dropping – I step out into the noisy dark; when the river is in spate it is even louder at night.

Over to the east, the three stars of Orion’s belt hang in a line over the lights of Allendale. The huge ash and its neighbour, the sycamore, magnificent trees by day, are combined in a single silhouette of black tracery, like the work of a paper-cut artist. The full glitter of the Milky Way spangles in a band way above our house. And shape‑shifting, green and red, are the sky-dancing lights of the aurora borealis.

I stand there in the cold garden, watching a deep pink flush pulsate across the northern sky, punctuated by the glittering of the Plough, its reassuringly familiar stars tipped jauntily at an angle over the wood. I stare up to Cassiopeia, another of my southern childhood stars that’s even more visible here where there’s so little light pollution. There are more dark sky discovery sites in the North Pennines than anywhere else in the UK; close by there’s one at Allendale golf course.

We see the aurora most winters here in Northumberland. Last October they were unusually vivid, the whole sky, edge to edge, lit up deep rose pink. Revealed from my phone with a few seconds’ shutter speed, I was astonished to see how eerie the garden had become, the grasses and sea hollies coloured from above in a strange orange-red warmth.

Sometimes we have to drive up the hill to watch the northern lights. Then they flicker in streaks across the distant Cheviots. But at times like tonight they’re visible down here in the valley. Each time I check outside it has become colder, the freeze deepening, my feet crunching on the gravel, icy intake of breath. On my last visit before bed, so fast that I wonder if I’ve imagined it, a shooting star plummets down to the southern horizon.

By morning, the whole garden is white with frost.