Tour at 20:30 Report from Elding: We were lucky that the wind was blowing from the south east, so our way in the bay was actually a nice and smooth ride. Only 25 mins after departure we had our first and weirdest encounter: A pod of 6-7 white beaked dolphins that were traveling towards us. When they reached us the played with our bow for a few... seconds! And that was it. Gone. They were completely gone! So we had no choice but to proceed our travel until, 20 minutes later we spotted a second pod of 4-5 dolphins. This time the dolphins were occupied in feeding (we could tell by the birds, the random movements and the breachings they were performing). So we actually got to stay quite a while with them, appreciating this unique moment and behaviour. Unfortunately after we left the dolphins we weren't´t able to find any whales, but our troubadour returned us the joy on our way back!
- Alberto Alejandro
Tour at 17:00
Report from Hafsúlan: For the beginning of our tour, the wind seemed to have calmed down even more, the sun was still shining as brightly as it had been during our first tour and clouds still were only further around the bay. Our first highlight were the numerous puffins we could see all around, some even feeding on sandeels. We encountered our first whale about 50 minutes away from the harbour, a feeding minke whale that surfaced for us 6 times, 3 of these very close to our left side. It was quite hard to follow, but everyone managed to get a good look at it and, only 2 minutes after deciding to leave this whale, we found ourselves a humpback whale. It was the same as in the morning tour at 9 am, which we could tell by the pattern on it's fluke. It was very curious at first and then wowed all of us with some peduncle slabs - throwing it's tail onto the water. A very exciting tour for all of us.
- Sabrina Voswinkel
Tour at 14:00
Report from Eldey: The sun was still very much out on our way out of the harbour and with the wind behind us it was actually quite warm! Leaving port we saw quite a few different birds species on our way to the main sighting arera, where we were rewarded by the sight of a few blows! We had a humpback whale feeding right amongst a big flock of seabirds! We could also tell there were multiple whales in the area because we could see some other blows further in the distance. We believe this whale was called Charlie because of the extremely white fluke, its small size and its tendency to not show its fluke when it went for dives. Fortunately, due to its feeding behaviour the whale surfaced quite frequently, and a few times very close to the boat!
-Rachel Pool
Tour at 13:00
Report from Hafsulan: The conditions where perfect for whale watching today, sunny and just a bit of wind. When we sailed out it took a bit of time before we saw the cetaceans. But than we saw birds in the distance, we headed that way. We found a 4 minke whales and 2 humpback whales feeding in this area. Amazing! We didn´t know where to look. On the way back we could enjoy the sun. It was a very nice tour.
- Alexandra Bouman
Tour at 10:00
Report from Eldey: What a beautiful Icelandic summer day! Everyone with sun glasses and a wind-proofed jacket was well-equipped for this amazing tour. (However, we provided warm overalls for everyone on board.) With the fresh wind in our back we sailed out into the bay, called Faxafloi. After a few miles of sailing we spotted a pot of 6-7 white-beaked dolphins, which seemed to be resting at the water surface, swimming very slowly. While watching this pod of dolphins, there was another pod of 4-5 dolphins approaching the same area. These animals were very relaxed and got as close as 20m to our vessel, allowing everyone to have a very good look at them. After we enjoyed watching them for a while, we decided to head further out in the bay as we spotted a few big flocks of feeding birds in the distance. As these birds are often seen feeding above the whales, we headed straight towards them. But before we even reached the biggest flocks, we were welcomed by the big blow of a humpback whale. It was heading towards another flock of birds, where we were able to watch it feeding close to the water surface. After we followed it around for a while and watched it surfacing and even showing its fluke, we decided to leave this whale and look for something else. We went towards the next big flock of birds. And again - a humpback whale feeding right underneath them. Wow! It is always a pleasure to watch these beauties. And it was a great finish of an amazing tour.
- Nicole Koestner
Tour at 9:00
Report from Hafsúlan: This was certainly a great day to be out on the water. Sunshine, light winds and clear skies. In addition, there was just a lot of animal life all around us. There were hundreds of Puffins today in addition to many large flocks of birds. Our first encounter was with 4-5 white-beaked dolphins! They were traveling rather quickly so we could keep up with them for a good 10 minutes until we decided to leave them be and keep heading further out to where we were seeing even more birds. Underneath 2 flocks of birds, we saw 2 minke whales feeding. One of them surfaced less than 150 meters away from us while feeding and then a third minke whale showed up. We were all enjoying this feeding action but, since we spotted a larger blow, indicative of another species, we went to check it out. Sure enough, we got to watch a humpback whale that was super interested in the boat, swimming around us and surfacing no more than 30 meters away. We could even see it's white pectoral fins under the water, hear it exhale and watch it's beautiful dive pattern, showing us it's tail.
-Sabrina Voswinkel
Birds seen on today's tour: Atlantic Puffin, Northern Fulmar, Northern Gannet, Black-backed Gull, Herring Gull, Common Guillemot, Arctic Skua, Manx Shearwater and Arctic Tern.
Status: RUNNING
We are sailing out from the Old Harbour in Reykjavik today. It might be a bit windy today so if you are sensitive to sea sickness, we do provide sea sickness tablets, free of charge! We hope you are able to join us on the search of these magnificent animals in their natural environment.
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