Tour at 20:30
Report from Eldey: The evening tour was probably the windiest tour of the day but the sea conditions were still nice and comfortable. After about an hour, we saw a big blow in front of us in a great distance. We approached the animal and found an elusive humpback whale. This individual did not come up to the surface very frequently and often changed its direction. It took as a long time to approach close enough to not only see the blow of the animal. However, after a while our patience was rewarded with two very nice fluke-ups in front of a beautiful sunset. While watching this humpback whale, we saw another big blow from far away and decided to try our luck the another individual. After about 10 minutes, we arrived in the area and watched another elusive humpback whale for a while. It was not bringing a lot of its body above the water surface and often it was mainly the blow that we saw. Also, it was surfacing very irregularly. However, it was traveling closer towards Reykjavík when we left it, so maybe we will see it on one of our tours tomorrow and get to see a bit more of it!
- Hanna Michel
Tour at 17:00
Report from Elding: The wind had picked up a little since the morning yet spirits were high due to the great visibility and bright sunshine. We headed out and were unlucky for an hour and half with no sightings and had gone very far into Faxa Bay. We started to turn around as we had heard of cetacean sightings from other boats behind us, but as we did this we saw several big blows very close together about 5 km out. My first reaction was that this was too far but we decided to go for it. On approach we thought that there were two whales, but this actually turned out to be 3 humpback whales! I could not believe my eyes that there were 3 of these usually solitary animals socialising together. After a few surfaces the medium-sized individual left and it was clear that the other two were a mother and calf from the way they were interacting, and the sheer size difference - the mother was without a doubt the largest humpback I have seen in this bay! These two were behaving very playfully, often turning at the surface, lightly tail slapping just under the water, fluking up, rolling and exposing their gleaming pectoral fins - a whole range of amazing behaviours! The passengers got some fantastic photos and memories of course too. Although we were a little late coming home, I´m sure everyone felt that it was worth it for such an extraordinary encounter!
- Ophelie Humphrey
Tour at 14:00
Report from Eldey: The weather remained sunny with little wind and the sea was fairly calm. Not long after leaving the harbour we saw the blows of a humpback whale in the distance. However, once we reached the area where we had seen the blows the whale could not be seen. We believe it could have been an injured one that had been seen close to the harbour the day before. As it was clearly trying to avoid the boat we continued sailing out in to the bay. About 30 minutes later we saw a second humpback whale. This one was not surfacing very frequently, spending long periods under the water. Suddenly, another humpback whale breached a little distance behind the boat, so we headed over to it to take a closer look. We watched the whale for a little while as it surfaced a few times before going for deeper dives. Eventually it suddenly breached to the delight of our passengers. It then started traveling away from us, so we went in search of other animals. Not long after, we encountered what was possibly a fourth humpback whale. As we approached it started logging and we were able to see the white of its large pectoral fins close to the surface. We were also able to see its double blowholes as it occasionally rose slightly above the surface to take a breath. A wonderful opportunity to see this magnificent animal so close.
- Julia Benson
Tour at 13:00
Report from Elding: Spotting conditions onboard were great for todays tour - with sunshine and calm seas. After 45 minutes of traveling we came across our first cetacean - the minke whale. This animal remained fairly elusive and unfortunately we did not see it re-surface - but in the meantime we were able to spot at least 2 harbour porpoises popping up all around the boat. We heard word that there was a humpback whale in the area so we traveled further out into Faxa Bay. We spotted the blow at least 2 km away. We were able to see the large mass of the humpback whale surface and saw its glistening tail fluke as it went for a deeper dive. We saw this animal surface numerous times but it was traveling a far distance in-between surfaces. Intrigued by splashes in the distance of Mount Kelir we decided to take a closer look. Unfortunately our search was fruitless but as we turned around we spotted another blow in the distance. As we drew closer we saw that it was indeed a humpback whale. There were unfortunately a lot of boats surrounding this animal so abiding by Ice Whales Code of Conduct we decided to leave it alone. As we headed towards Reykjavik we spotted another blow of a humpback whale! We were able to see this animal surface once and on waiting for its re-surface we spotted a minke whale. This animal surfaced over 4 times within 200 m of the boat. As we headed back towards the harbour we were even able to take off the overalls and bask in the sunshine!
- Darcy Philpott
Tour at 10:00
Report from Eldey: The weather was really nice, sunny and with almost no wind, so the sea was quite calm when sailing out. In the bay the sea remained calm and we had excellent spotting conditions. There were lots of puffins and other bird species around during the first part of the trip and the views of the peninsula's surrounding the bay were incredible. After about an hour and a half sailing we spotted a humpback whale. The animal was traveling, heading in one direction and surfacing frequently and showing of its beautiful flukes when it went for a deeper dive. It turned out this animal was a familiar face, it was Þröstur. The animal changed directions unexpectedly and surfaced right next to the boat giving our passengers a bit of a fright. We left Þröstur because we heard there were dolphins around. We found a pod of 5 Atlantic white beaked dolphins. We saw them surfacing a number of times and they came quite close to the boat. A good tour with nice views of Þröstur the humpback whale and a group of Atlantic white beaked dolphins.
- Anouk de Plaa
Tour at 09:00
Report from Elding: We had glorious sunshine on this tour although there was a little wind so many people sensibly borrowed our overalls to make the most of the weather. After only half an hour we came across a small pod of 3 harbour porpoises. They were being typically elusive although making quite a splash at the surface, so naturally we didn´t stop for them but continued into the bay. After 20 minutes more we saw a dark curved fin coming out of the water towards us belonging to a minke whale. As if it´d taken a tip from the porpoises this individual was also elusive but not quite as distant to the boat so the passengers got a good look on the occasions it surfaced 100 m from the boat. After 10 minutes more traveling we spotted a big flock of birds within which came up another minke whale, and also a big blow behind it! So we headed to the blow which turned out to be a humpback whale, beautifully fluking up between shallow dives and showing us the underside of it´s fluke enough to realise this was our old friend Þröstur. It was not long before we were joined by many other boats so we decided to leave this individual after ~20 minutes and head home. On our journey back we were surprised to see some big splashes to our left made by 2-5 white-beaked dolphin leaping everywhere! When approached them they even came towards the boat and started bowriding to the delight of the passengers. There appeared to be many more dolphin in the surrounding area, at least 10 here, and we crossed another pod of ~12 individuals further on our way back too. How great to have a 4 species tour, with the fluking humpback and the leaping dolphins as the stars of the show.
- Ophelie Humphrey
Birds seen on today´s tour: atlantic puffin, arctic skua, arctic tern, manx shearwater, northern gannet, common guillemot, razorbill, black-legged kittiwake, northern fulmar, greater black-backed gulls, lesser black-backed gulls.
Status: RUNNING
We are sailing out from the old harbor in Reykjavík today. The swells have calmed down and the sea should be quite calm today
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