Monday, 10 August 2015

Tour at 17:00

Report from Eldey: The Cold winds and choppy seas greeted us as we left Reykjavík harbour again this afternoon. We decided to head towards the area where we'd spotted Þröstur the humpback whale earlyer today. On our way to that area we encountered a shy minke whale that surfaced twice before dissapearing on us. We continued on and finally found the humpback again! It breached once as we arrived in the area and showed us its flukes twice buth otherwice Þröstur was very chill and surfacing slowly. We spent as much time with it as we could but finally had to return back towards harbour. On the way back we encountered a pod of fast harbour porpoises that showed themselves three times. An amaizing day out in the harbour.

- Svala Jónsdóttir

Tour at 14:00

Report from Hafsúlan: This trip was no less bumpy than the morning tour marking everyone who joined us an excellent sailor after this experience. As we were heading out we heard about a humpback whale that had been spotted further offshore and decided to go there as well. It  took about  an hour to get to that area but then we were rewarded with a humpback whale. This animal was feeding close to the water surface for a while with hundreds of birds around it so that we could just watch it very easily as it didn't go for long dives. Nevertheless, it showed us its fluke multiple times making everyone on board pretty happy. We tried to also find a minke whale on the way back, after we had been heading a little further in to Faxaflói. And indeed, suddenly a minke whale popped up only about 150 m away from us. We stopped and tried to spot it again; however, it went for a deep dive and just vanished. We would have like to get a better look at this minke but after the nice humpback whale encounter it wasn't too bad that the minke whale was rather shy today. 

- Hanna Michel

Tour at 13:00

Report from Eldey: The wind dropped on this afternoon´s tour, which made for a nice sailing. We traveled west to the area of this morning´s tour and after about an hour´s sailing the captain spotted a big bushy blow of a humpback whale. We soon found out it was þröstur and it was incredible, it was feeding so close to the boat and he/she brought up its fluke many times giving the passengers a great show. Once the other whale watching boats came we left the area and on the way home got greeted by a lovely group of white-beaked dolphins. At least 7 individuals which also showed themselves well giving the passengers a lot of opportunities to take some nice pictures. 

-Megan Whittaker

Tour at 10:00

Report from Hafsúlan: On this fully booked tour we went out from Reykjavík like our sister boat Eldey an hour earlier. It was pretty rough today with some swell and lots of waves. It was a fun way in to Faxaflói as we were going against the waves first. It took a little while until we spotted a whale on this tour. We headed into an area with other whale watching boats like Eldey and then spotted a minke whale. It surfaced only about 150 m away from us a few times before going for a dive. We managed to see it a few more times coming up so that everyone got a look at this individual. However, it was not that easy to keep track off and see in between the waves, so we moved on to find something else. We were hoping to also find a pod of the white-beaked dolphins but only our Captain spotted two individuals that immediately vanished. On the way back to the harbour we got to see incredible bird life around us but no more cetaceans. 

- Hanna Michel

Tour 09:00

Report from Eldey: We traveled out west to the area we had a humpback whale on yesterday´s evening tour. The sea was rough but the passengers enjoyed it. We first saw a blow which allowed us to change course and come closer to a minke whale that was feeding under birds quite close to the boat. It surfaced a few times but you had to be looking in the right place at the right time to get a look. We searched some more but soon left the area and had to head home. Then another boat informed us of some incredible white-beaked dolphins. 6-8 of them that swam under and around the boat. A nice end to a challenging tour. 

-Megan Whittaker

Bird species seen on today's tours include: northern gannets, northern fulmars, kittiwakes, manx shearwaters, lesser and greater black-backed seagulls, common guillemots, black guillemots, brunich's guillemots, little auks, arctic skua and atlantic puffins.