Friday, 19 September 2014

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: The rain spotted and we could enjoy this tour in dryness, the sun pushing through the clouds and the sun's rays shining over the landscape. It took us a while to spot our first marine mammal but once we did it was none stop there after. It was a small pod of white-beaked dolphins, pod of 3-4 individuals that surfaced right next to us and then suddenly travelled under the boat and was not seen again. Whilst we were looking for the dolphins a minke whale surfaced 300m in front of us, we got closer and the minke surfaced a few more times. There were at least another 2-3 more minkes seen on the tour and one was a minke we knew very well called 'humpie' a minke seen on many of our tours this summer and every year since 2011. Its always great to see one of our regular minke whales still around.

- Megan Whittaker

Tour at 09:00Report from Hafsúlan: it was light rain and not so good visibility but totally calm sea as we went out this morning. We had arrived at the Marfló area and begun searching more closely when another whale-watching boat alerted us of the presence of some white-beaked dolphins but as we were heading in their direction, a minke whale popped up about 5-600 meters away so we stopped and took a turn towards it. We saw it surfacing a few times in a bit of a distance but then we lost it; that is until the whale came up literally 20-30 meters from the left of the bow! It continued in that direction and then came up in front of us, surfacing many times right there as if it was trying to lead us somewhere, almost like Lassy the dog! Once it was gone, we then had a group (ca 10-15) of white-beaked dolphins, and a rarer sight now than this summer in the shape of Arctic Skua, for a delightful half-an-hour or so before we headed back to Reykjavik.- Baldur Thorvaldsson

Birds seen on today's tour include: northern gannet, sooty shearwater, manx shearwater, arctic skua, northern fulmar, common guillemot, greater black-backed gull.