Other things to note, if you are trying to get a nice photo of the aurora, you will also need to plan the location before dark...
From my experience is that,
- At many hotels, you won't actually have a very scenic view, so you will have to drive out further (at least 15-20 mins) to get to some places with foreground/background and/or a dark enough place.
- In some (many) case, even finding a safe spot to park the car then to shoot the aurora is already a challenge. So to reduce the time spent to hunt for parking spots when the aurora is up there, do scout early.
*because when I was able to see aurora, I'm stuck in somewhere ulu with no good natural foreground/background (plain low mountains/hills), so, many times end up shooting with the rented car as foreground -_- *
Check aurora forecast regularly, especially so before you move out for aurora hunting (
http://en.vedur.is/weather/forecasts/aurora/)
- If it's completely dark green = heavy overcast no chance..
- Light Green = light overcast, aurora can be seen illuminating the clouds (green clouds)
- White = clear sky... hope you can see it. There can be nights where the sky is CLEAR, but no aurora... so it's really based on luck.
Use the website to plan your schedule for the night... it's so far pretty accurate (at least it can give you a rough guideline on the upcoming days what to expect).
Gear wise, like DD123 said, try to get the best ISO performance camera you can afford. As you will be shooting in high ISO most of the time (usually in the region of 1600-3200). And these settings are assuming you are using a lens of aperture f2.8. So, if you are using kit lens, like 18-55 (where the largest aperture is f3.5), you might have to bump the ISO even higher.
Typically, for Milky Way/Aurora, many would prefer to use Ultra wide Angle lens (UWA), and the "cheapest" UWA lens with f2.8 is probably going to cost from 300-500+ (depending used or 2nd hand).