A reindeer's-eye view of holiday displays

Bob Krier and Brian Wentworth see Christmas lights the way Santa Claus sees them -- banking above rooftops at 500 feet above the ground.

The owners of Hawk Eye Helicopter provide many rides in a typical year, doing county fairs and summer festivals, aerial photography and deer counts, and even flying people around to look at real estate.

But from Thanksgiving to New Year's Day, the Blaine company is all about Christmas lights and scenic night tours, when certain neighborhoods glow in the darkness below like the little ceramic villages people display this time of year.

"You get to see more than just the Christmas lights," Krier said. "You see the neighborhoods. And a lot of people just enjoy flying in a helicopter."

There are obvious differences in seeing holiday lights from the sky than on the ground. Detail is traded for perspective. Roughly the whole metro area is within reach of an hourlong helicopter trip. Downtowns become snow globes. Even routine nighttime traffic becomes a spectacle.

On a recent cold, calm night, Krier piloted from the Anoka County-Blaine Airport over to the east and a particularly good light-viewing neighborhood in Lino Lakes. Then, he headed south to St. Paul and west to Minneapolis before heading back north to Blaine. From above, St. Paul's Rice Park and a nearby ice skating rink glittered in warm yellow light, a giant plume of steam rising from a nearby building.

Downtown Minneapolis, reached in a minute, was business as usual but jaw-droppingly impressive in its own Grinchy, non-holiday way.

Flying is a side business for Krier, of Andover, and Wentworth, of Champlin. Krier is a construction worker, Wentworth a police detective.

They've been in business for a couple years and took the Christmas lights idea from a friend in Iowa from whom they bought the helicopter.

The helicopter seats three passengers. An hour-long trip -- which could make it as far as Lakeville and back -- costs $550. A half-hour trip -- to Minneapolis and St. Paul and back -- costs $300. For a 15-minute flight, expect to pay $200.