Friday, 18 March 2016

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: The weather did not change much this afternoon, less drizzle and the sun was higher so the overall brightness was much better, this made taking photographs easier. We headed towards the same area as the morning, took us about an hour to reach it and it wasn't long before we found a small pod of travelling white-beaked dolphins, maybe 3-5 animals. After a few minutes of enjoying them we got word from another whale watching vessel about a couple of humpback whales they found. 2 humpback whales feeding under a huge flock of seabirds, mainly gulls, fulmars and eider ducks. They were great, showing their fluke as they dived down. There must have been 2-3 others that we encountered on this tour, one near the end we could follow just under the waters surface for a very long time, seemed to be travelling towards the big flock of birds quite fast. A small individual of maybe 11-12 meters long. On the way home we got a surprise when another humpback whale started lunge feeding a few hundred meters infront of the boat. We had to stop, even though we were already late back' it was amazing to see the mouth open wide and the baleen plates hanging down. It was lunge feeding a few more times before we really had to head home. A great day with lots of life. 

- Megan Whittaker

Tour at 9:00

Report from Hafsúlan: We sailed out from Reykjavik old harbour today with overcast skies, fine drizzle and calm seas, Not the nicest of weathers because it hindered the visibility of some of the landscape but great spotting conditions. After about an hours sailing we started to see splashes from white-beaked dolphins. It was hard to count exacly how many there were but thoughout the tour there must have been over 100 dolphins, scattered in the area. We also encountered 4 humpback whales. Two solitary individuals and a pair and the blow from a 5th in the distance. They seemed to be travelling and either enjoying or being annoyed by the dolphins. All humpback whales encountered had a following of dolphins, at least 5-7 which each humpback. Usually the humpbacks are annoyed by these pesky animals but the whales looked to be enjoying them today, they were gently rolling  and travelling slowly with them. A few loud trumpet blows but it was definitly hard to tell if they liked or disliked the attention. The white-beaked dolphins were everywhere you looked breaching (front, side and back), leaping, surfing, sharking. The whole morning was just incredible. could not have been better. 

- Megan Whittaker

Bird species seen on todays tours include: northern fulmar, blue fulmar, glaucous gull, Iceland gull, greater black-backed gull, lesser black-backed gull, kittiwake, shag, long-tailed duck, king eider, eider duck, sandpipers and a great skua.