Saturday, 21 December 2024

Today's whale watching tour is on schedule from Reykjavík this afternoon! Remember to dress according to weather and feel free to borrow our thermal overalls if needed!

• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 13:00

Report from Eldey: Today was the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, and we were determined to make the most of the little daylight we had by seeing some wildlife! We set out under bright but cloudy skies, and sailed to the area where the whales have been hanging out for the last month. Soon after arriving there, we spotted our first humpback whale. This individual was feeding, changing directions a lot, but not diving for very long. It was shy with its fluke but we were spoiled with many sightings of it. Once in particular, it came so close to the front of the boat, we could see its whole body through the water and the passengers on the bow would have definitely felt some whale breath on their faces. While we were watching this whale, we spotted more blows a little further away and went to check them out. It turned out to be a pair of humpbacks swimming together! These ones were a lot more relaxed than the first individual and were doing slightly longer dives but we were equally lucky with some very close encounters with these two as well. Eventually all three whales started swimming in the same area so we could watch all of them at once! The pair were still pretty relaxed but the solo individual started more actively lunge feeding! The perfect end to our tour!

- Emily Erskine

Glaucous gull, Iceland gull, eider duck, black guillemot, common guillemot, European shag, Great cormorant, herring gull, black-backed gull