Tour status: RUNNING
Tour at 20:30
Report from Hafsúlan: The weather had cleared up by the time we left for our evening tour, and we were able to enjoy the beautiful sight of the landscape on our way out of the harbour. We soon spotted a harbour porpoise, on our way out, shortly followed by a humpback whale. This whale was Fluke, an individual who has been spotted here since 2015. A pod of at least 5 white-beaked dolphins also travelled just 100 meters away from the boat, and a minke whale surfaced a few times, a little further back. But the star of the day was Charlie, another humpback that has been spotted here since 2015, who approached the boat until it was touching it, and stayed with us over half an hour, right next to us, popping its head up to the surface and swimming under the boat and resurfacing on the other side several times. It was a truely incredible tour! We headed back to the harbour completely amazed by this unique experience while enjoying the live music on board and the beautiful landscape under the midnight sun.
-Anne Moullier
Tour at 17:00
Report from Eldey: Not many people were not afraid of rain and joined us for this tour but the brave ones which showed up where an amazing team! It was almost constantly raining but wind went down so sea surface was perfectly calm. With this conditions I was hoping to see tiny harbour porpoises and I didn't´t get disappointed. We saw big group, 10-20 harbour porpoises and they were everywhere! It was cool to watch them this playful that we almost missed our first minke whale! In total we found maybe 8 or more minke whales but they were busy with feeding and didn't´t stay long on the surface but at the end we spend some great time with couple of minkes traveling side by side. One of them was much smaller so probably it was a mother and her baby on it´s first travel to Iceland.
- Ewa Malinowska
Tour at 14:00
Report from Hafsulan: Rain was our companion in our afternoon trip but we sailed out with a viking spirit as we were celebrating the first world cup match of Iceland. This was proved to be our lucky charm because we got blessed by cetacean´s gods. We have seen many of them, more than 20 harbour porpoises were crossing our path, at least 2 minke whales, 2 pods of white-beaked dolphins with 10-12 individuals (and some calves in between!) but the cherry on the top of the cake was a relaxed humpback whale which surfaced several times close to us. Definitely, Iceland should play more often world cups if it´s going to bring us such luck!
-Rodrigo A. Martinez Catalan
Tour at 13:00
Report from Eldey: So the rain would not stop, the wind did not blow and so the conditions where not too comfortable but still the visibility for spotting cetaceans almost ideal. So it came yet another time we found the smallest cetaceans of our waters, the harbour porpoise, quickly. Passing them a minke whale should be our next encounter, and some more where to come. In total we saw three of them at this tour and all of them appeared to be feeding according to their rapid change of direction and unsteady surfacing pattern. A fast moving pod of white beaked dolphin crossed our path before we finally found a humpback whale, also surrounded by many feeding birds and rolling before it went to dive down. We almost lost track of time and where quite far out in the bay, so we hurried back home and on our way still saw two more minke whales.
-Valentin Witek
Tour at 10:00
Report from Hafsúlan: It was like the sky was falling down it was raining so much but that did not stop us from going out and spot some cetaceans. The sea was smooth and the spotting conditions were great. We were not far away from Reykjavík when we spotted 6-8 white-beaked dolphins! They were feeding so we could see their splashes and we noticed that there were 2 babies in the pod. One of them was staying close to its mother and surfacing with her, very cool encounter. The next spotting was not long after we left the dolphins, it was a little seal! Then on the other side of the boat there were around 8 harbour porpoises surfacing and traveling very fast. We could look at them for a good time but the left quickly so we continued. We spotted a big blow and a big back not to far away from the boat, it was a humpback whale! It surfaced a few times but always going for dives but only showed us its fluke once. We were able to identify the whale and it was Charlie, a humpback that has been seen every year since 2015. We saw another humpback not to far away and then on our way back to harbour there was a spotting of a minke whale. Great tour even though we got a little cold from the rain!
-Kolbrún Þóra Sverrisdóttir
Tour at 09:00
Report from Eldey: Rain today was not too strong but dropped constantly and would not give us a rest until the evening. Wind had to make it up to us, so there was no and the sea has been flat and smooth all day long. In the morning many were full of hope, wishing to see the first cetaceans of their lives and the crew was happy to serve. It was one of these tours where we saw all of the common whales and dolphins of the bay, even one humpback whale was feeding, according to all of the birds around it's surfacing areas, when we passed it. At least three minke whales and two elusive pods of white beaked dolphins where accompanied by diving seabirds as well. And a small pod of harbour porpoises was seen for at least a few times on the surface, elusive as we know them.
- Valentin Witek
Birds seen during our trip: eider duck, northern fulmar, atlantic puffin, common guillemot, razorbill, black-legged kittiwake, manx shearwater, lesser black-backed gull, northern gannet.
We are sailing out from the Old Harbour in Reykjavik. There is some wind and swells out on Faxabay so if you are sensitive to motion sickness we do have seasickness tablets free of charge at the ticket office.All our boats have inside and outside areas and to make the tour even more comfortable we provide warm overalls. For more information please contact us via phone at +354 519 5000 or by e-mail at elding@elding.is.
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