Tour status: RUNNING
Tour at 19:00
Report from Hafsúlan: The continuation of good weather was still keeping everybody in high spirits. It took us about an hour to get to the place where we saw a lovely group of maybe 8-10 white-beaked dolphins. They were playing really close around our boat. We continued the trip and saw probably around 6-8 minke whales around us. Also while we were waiting for one misbehaved humpback whale, that we only saw the spout of from a distance, but eluded us for a very long time before we had to go back to the harbour. As a bonus, we saw another pod of dolphins jumping out of the water like there was no tomorrow. With the romantic sun setting behind us, we sailed back to the home port.
-Lucas Heinrich
Tour at 17:00
Report from Eldey: The wind had picked up a little but with the sun in our face we were happy to get this tour started! Upon sailing out we got a call from our colleagues and headed that direction and found a humpback whale! It was a well known but bit shy individual. Nevertheless we were able to stay with it for quite some time and inbetween we saw briefly some harbour porpoises surfacing close to our boat. As we went on we quickly found 2 minke whales and at that moment we saw another blow of a humpback whale! As we came closer we even saw a pod of white-beaked dolphins, around 4-6 individuals. In the distance we saw another pod of really active dolphins, probably 8-10 individuals this time. This was just an amazing tour and we started to run out of time. On our way back we even saw another minke whale, just incredible!
- Sarah Kompatscher
Tour at 14:00
Report from Hafsúlan: The sun held through out the tour, providing quite an enjoyable ride. On our side the tour was a bit more challenging, though. We were scanning the area continuously, as usual, however it took us while to spot our first minke whale. This one was playing hard to get, but we manage to fallow it for a while. Through our chase we realized that we had at least two more minke whales around us! Our persistency paid off! Later on we ran into a pod of 4 or 5 white-beaked dolphins, but these were also unusually illusive, so we lost track of them. We stayed round the area for a few more minutes in hopes of re-sighting them again, but unfortunately we were already running out of time and had to start heading back to the harbor.
- Ines Cunha
Tour at 13:00
Report from Eldey: We sailed out under beautiful sunshine and flat seas once again on this early afternoon tour. Barely 45 minutes in, we started seeing large flocks of feeding seabirds, and soon enough, a minke whale appeared in the midst. After a few quick surfaces, some of which were quite close to the boat, the whale went for a deeper dive and was not seen again. We continued our search further into the bay until we saw some splashes, and found a pod of at least 10 white-beaked dolphins! The dolphins were very interactive and playful today, jumping around the boat and bow-riding for a little while. They reappeared a few times as we continued our cruise in the bay. A beautiful day to be in the bay!
-Anne Moullier
Tour at 10:00
Report from Hafsúlan: Everything is better with the sun shinning and calm seas. But, to be honest, we didn't really need that. This tour by it self was a cool one. First we saw a pod of 5-6 white-beaked dolphins 40 minutes into the tour. The group was very special because they had 3 youngsters among them, of which one was a baby, only days old. We left them be and sailed forward. After that, another group of dolphins could be seen, jumping out in the distance. In the meantime we were surrounded by minke whales. We could at least 10 of them in the wider search area. Feeding together with the birds, the minkes were participating in a giant fish buffet. We saw a humpback whale from a distance as well, but we we didn't manage to observe it from a shorter distance. Finally, we had to go back. But as awesome this trip was we saw a bother huge spout in the distance. It turned out to be another humpback whale. This time we had a really close encounter and could really see the size of this gentle giant.
-Lucas Heinrich
Tour at 09:00
Report from Eldey: Beautiful sunshine awaited us this morning, calm seas and almost no wind, this could just become a whale of a day :) We sailed out enjoying the sun as we saw in distance lots of seabirds in multiple flocks, being very active. As the sea was so calm we could already see from far distance that cetaceans were around. Coming closer to the area we started seeing one minke whale after the other. Over the entire tour even 10-15 individuals! This was just incredible. Some came in quite close, others we could observe in further distance. After spending a lot of time with this beautiful creatures we sailed out further and came quite quickly across a big pod of white-beaked dolphins. It seemed like they were playing with us, always being around the boats, that we turned around and around. The dolphins, a total of 25-30, were really curious and playful, leaping out of the water and showing off. Unfortunately time is running fast if you enjoy as much, but even on our way back we encountered more minke whales around us!
- Sarah Kompatscher
Birds seen on todays tours: northern gannet, northern fulmar, Atlantic puffin, manx shearwater, arctic skua, great skua, lesser black-backed gull, black guillemot, common guillemot, Arctic tern
We are running our tours today from the Old Harbour in Reykjavík, sea conditions are favorable and the sun is shining on us today so grab your sunglasses and join us on an exciting Whale Watching adventure today! Please don't hesitate to contact our ticket office for further information, either via phone +354 5195000 or elding@elding.is
