Saturday, 27 December 2014

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan and Elding: we went out on two boats today as we had a number of passengers. It was as cold as one would expect from late December but the sea was virtually flat and visibility was great; the mountain peaks were also stunningly snow-covered. There was a lot of birdlife on the water and they seemed to be feeding which was a very good sign as food supply is essential for cetaceans to be present. Our first cetacean sighting was that of about 3 white-beaked dolphins, which we managed to follow and see quite well, although they and the following group of about the same size were spending a bit of time under the surface and appearing in places far away from one another, even if usually rather close. After the first two encounters, we went further out into the bay and encountered more dolphins there, but this time a much better and a bit larger group, and which made it even better, had at least one and maybe two delightful little calves! Mother dolphins are often protective of their calves against boats but these were anything but that and even seemed to enjoy showing their offspring to us! There was a whole lot of splashing and close approaches and we got some really good looks at the calves. Towards the end we encountered another group of 5-6 dolphins, we also got a good look at them while they swam calmly around the area.

- Baldur og Sigurlaug