Tour status: RUNNING
Tour at 17:00
Report from Hafsulan: It was a nice ride! We started under shining sun, to went under total overcast and fog to end up with clear sky. There was almost no wind and sea was like a mirror but some swell moved us up and down at the beginning. Normally we do not expect to see animals closer than 30 min of sailing but this evening dolphins were just next to Engey. Pod of 8 white-beaked dolphins was just relaxing under evening sun. Way to the next cetacean took us bit longer but we were grateful to had close encounter with minke whale. It was quite big individual, maybe even more than 8m. On the way back, again next to island Engey we had another meeting, this time with 4 harbour porpoises.
- Ewa Malinowska
Tour at 14:00
Report from Elding: The weather for this afternoon improved a lot and sightings followed too. It didn´t take long until we have our first species and it was white-beaked dolphin. There were many of them, at least 20, jumping out of the water in perfect synchrony and getting curious about us around the boat. In the middle of the dolphin moment 2 minke whales popped up out of nowhere. Once we moved further away, we spotted 2 more feeding in between a huge flock of seabirds. In our way home, we had the opportunity to see at least 4 more of these beautiful animals. It was an incredible tour.
-Rodrigo A. Martinez Catalan
Tour at 13:00
Report from Hafsulan: Apart from a bit of a swell, the weather was quite enjoyable throughout all the journey. We did not have to wait long for our first sighting, as we spotted a minke whale not to far from Reykjavik. We were able to follow this animal for quite a while and at some point we got it quite close to our vessel. As we were accompanying this whale, we spotted two more far ahead. So, in the end it was possible to enjoy the presence of a few Minke whales spread around us. On our way back, a few white-beaked dolphins (7 to 10 individuals) approached us, making this experience even better! The tour was not lacking on bird sightings either, such as puffins, arctic terns, fulmars and northern gannets.
- Ines Cunha
Tour at 10:00
Report from Elding: The hopes of seeing cetaceans today were high as the swell. The wind was easy on us, though and staying outside on the deck a pleasure. Shortly after some passengers pointed at the small and elusive harbor porpoises we got the news from colleges about sightings in the west. There we went and cetaceans we saw. At least two minke whales were feeding close to our vessels and slowly the boats spread again when the animals did so too. Following the trace of one of them lead to many others, so we could observe between 5 and even 10 of them most likely while they were feeding. Still not satisfied, we would not head straight back home but made a detour to the north, which paid off: A big pod, maybe around 20 white beaked dolphins convoyed us for a while.
- Valentin Witek
Tour at 09:00
Report from Hafsulan: The weather improved a bit from yesterday. Still we were facing some swell, especially going out, but the wind had dropped as we set sail. As we went further out in the bay we met more and more feeding seabirds. Witnessing how the northern gannets are hunting is always exciting and definitely a good indicator for food abundance. So we slowed down and started scanning the surface. First a minke whale appeared real quickly as a humpback whale followed. We kept our eyes on the humpback as it showed its fluke when it went for a first deep dive. One short moment we saw even quickly 2 white-beaked dolphins. We kept on looking as again a minke whale came up, at one moment we were having even 3 in the same picture, just seconds apart. Now the humpback surfaced again in front of our boat and showed us again its fluke. Unfortunately this was the last time we saw this animal but luckily we were surrounded by minke whales, a total of probably 5-6, some of them being in the distance. As we kept staying still it was really easy to look at the minkes feeding around us. Another great tour out in Faxafloi.
- Sarah Kompatscher
Bird species seen on today's tours include: black legged kittiwake, northern fulmar, northern gannet, common gullemot, eider duck, Atlantic puffin, greater black backed gull, manx shearwater.
We are sailing from the Old Harbour in Reykjavík today, there will be some movement out on the boat today and we do have sea sickness tablets at the ticket office free of charge. For more information you can contact us by email elding@elding.is or by phone +354 519 5000
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