Monday, 1 june 2015

Tour at 17:00

Report from Hafsúlan: On the evening tour we started by sailing west out in Faxaflói. The rough sea was still present and the boat started to rock from side to side when we left the protection of the harbour. But passengers used the overalls that we are offering for free and the weather was good for the first half of the tour. We shortly passed by 3 harbour porpoises that was traveling, giving us short views of this small but beautiful cetacean. After nearly one hour of sailing we spotted our first minke whale, it turned out to be very elusive only surfacing twice in some distance from the boat. At the same time a pod of 4-5 harbour porpoises was present in the area. After these short encounters we were surprised by strong winds and the swells built up quickly. We had to start heading back to Reykjavik and the journey back become rough. Due to the short encounters with the cetaceans on this tour and the rough journey back we offered all of our passengers complimentary tickets. The ticket is valid for two years on one of our whale watching tours.  

- Marcus Bergström

Tour at 14:00

Report from Elding: We made our way out into the rough sea from Reykjavík again. During the first hour of the tour, we encountered three small groups of harbour porpoises.They all seemed in a good mood for whale watching as they came close to our boat and swam underneath it, so that we could follow them with our eyes underwater. Of course we kept searching for a larger species, and were rewarded with a friendly minke whale that also did not seem to be disturbed by our presence. It came close to our boat a couple of times and we could watch it feeding with a small flock of northern gannets around that were plunge-diving into the water. All in all, a nice, bumpy tour full of cetaceans and birds.

- Hanna Michel

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: The weather was much better than in the morning tour, the wind was not as strong and the swells were getting smaller so the sailing was more comfortable. We decided to head to the area where we had found the first minke whale of the morning tour. On our way we saw a pod of 4-5 harbour porpoises, we got a good look at these cute cetaceans and followed them for two minutes before we lost sights of them. We kept on going and found a flock of feeding birds, mainly arctic terns. When we got closer to the birds we saw a blow under the birds. We soon realized there were at least two minke whales in the area. They were both elusive and we only got to see them few times before we had to turn around and get back to land. We decided to get earlier to land because of an accident, when a passenger fell down one of the stairs on the boat but fortunately he was able to stand up and walk with help of the boat when we got to land where he got medical help. Because the tour was shorter than usually all of our passengers were offered refund or a new ticket. Of course we hope most of our passengers will be able to get out on sea with us again and then get a better look at the whales and dolphins of Faxaflói.

- Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir

Tour at 10:00

Report from Elding: It always looks nice and calm in the harbour, a sheltered area from the stronger winds in the open Faxaflói bay. It was quite fun for a lot of our passengers, especially the sea goinging individuals, which stayed on the lower deck at the front and had a bit of a shower now and again. The wildlife seemed to love it too, surfing the swells. All together we must have seen at least 3 different individual minke whales, occasionally surfacing close to the boat, a pod of 3 - 4 white-beaked dolphins and 3-4 pods of 2-3 individual harbour porpoises which popped to the surface sporadically throughout the tour. The birds were impressive too, plunging gannets, paddling puffins, skimming terns. A mecca of species in a productive bay. A fun but rocky morning out on the bay. 

- Megan Whittaker

Tour at 09:00

Report from Hafsúlan: The sun was shining in the harbour when we started our journey out on Faxaflói this morning. When we got further out on the bay we felt the wind blowing strongly from east and the sea got rough. After about 40 minutes we saw a flock of feeding arctic terns, we stopped to see if we could find any cetaceans feeding underneath the birds and spotted 2-3 elusive harbour porpoises. Then we saw a small minke whale, we were able to follow the minke whale for a long time but it was difficult because it was traveling fast and always into the swells so our boat was rocking a lot up and down. we then saw another minke whale that seemed bigger than the one we had been following. While we watched the second minke whale of the tour we saw 4 white beaked dolphins, it was so much fun watching these beautiful animals leaping around the boat and one of them was a small calf. on the way back we saw the third minke whale of the tour, we didn't have time to stop but we saw it surfacing 4 times before it got in a longer distance from the boat. 

- Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir

Birds spotted on today's tours include: northern gannets, kittiwake, black backed gulls, northern fulmars, common guillemots, puffins, arctic terns, shags, arctic skuas, great skua, red-necked phalaropes, razorbills.