THURSDAY, 7 SEPTEMBER

Tour at 17:00

Report from Elding: What a wonderful evening tour we have had today. We were about to leave the harbour when we spotted the first species, it was a minke whale! We didn't spend many time with this animal because we knew that Faxafloi was boiling in cetacean activity today and we were right. In our way to one of our main spotting areas we saw two harbour porpoises crossing by in front of us and not longer after that three white-beaked dolphins were surfacing for a long period next to us. That wasn't all, moments later we found a blow in the distance and we got closer to discover that it was again another minke whale, and it wasn't alone. At least 3 of them were surfacing now and then and even one of them got less than 20 m from our boat, it was amazing! With all of this in our pocket we went back to Reykjavik after enjoying an incredible tour.

-Rodrigo A. Martinez Catalan 

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: What an exciting tour! Weather was perfect, no wind, no swell and we had a chance to see all of our favorite 4 species of cetaceans! First we spotted pod of 4 white-beaked dolphins. Between them we recognized two individuals: Connor and Large Nick. After good time with dolphins we went to watch minke whales. Again it was plenty of them, probably feeding as in the same area we were watching flock of diving northern gannets. We saw at least 6 individuals of this small whales. We saw also few harbour porpoises and even take good look at them. On the way back we found our final surprise, a humpback whale! This giant was deep diving and we need a lot of patience but we saw its tail twice! 

- Ewa Malinowska 

Tour at 9:00

Report from Hafsúlan: It was a beautiful morning to be out on the water. There was no wind, no waves, no rain. With the sky being slightly overcast it was ideal spotting conditions as the water color was almost light grey and thus a great contrast to the animals body colors. We sailed for about 45 minutes when we spotted a minke whale. This was definitely a juvenile, as it was still very small. After watching it for a few minutes, a fully grown minke whale surfaced and from then on stayed rather close to the smaller one. This led us to believe that it may be a mother and her calf of last years summer, which of course would be awesome to see her returning to this bay with her calf. They didn't mind the presence of the boat at all and even came as close as 10m to us! We stayed with them for nearly an hour until we decided it was better to leave them alone. On our way away from them, we got to enjoy 3-4 harbour porpoises that seemed to also be feeding, as they stayed in the same area. It is very rare to get to see these little cetaceans so well so it was a great experience. It was a beautiful tour and I hope it continues all throughout the rest of the day.

- Sabrina Voswinkel

Birds seen today: Northern Gannet, Common Guillemot, Northern Fulmar, Cormorant, Atlantic Puffin, Manx Shearwater and Eider Duck.

Status: RUNNING

We are sailing out from the Old Harbour in Reykjavik today. There is litttle to no wind and it looks like the sun will be shining on us today. Hope you are able to join us on our Whale Watching tour