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Sunday, 3 November 2024
- CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 09:00
- CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 13:00
Reykjavík:
Today's 09:00 tour is cancelled due to weather, but the 13:00 tour is on schedule and operating as normal! Remember to dress according to weather and feel free to borrow our thermal overalls if needed!
CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 1300
Report from Eldey: We set off with the strong winds behind us but still had to endure rain for a fair amount of the tour. But this didn´t stop it from being a really great tour. We started off finding a pod of 3 harbour porpoises early on followed by a grey seal that was bottling. Then we found a second pod of 4 porpoises. Once we got further out we found the best of it. To start with there was a pod of 4 white beaked dolphins. They were easy to watch and then we got to see them bowriding. They then vanished but reppeared with a humpback whale. This whale was Flak, the same one we usually see close to Reykjavik during the winter. This is the first time we have spotted this individual during the winter further out in the bay. Whilst with Flak we also saw repeated blows from a second humpback further away. But as usual we got a great show seeing a couple fluke dives from very close. We then headed back into the wind very very happy.
- Rob Hyman
Bird species seen today include:
Sooty sherwater, black legged kittiwake, black headed gull, northern fulmar, glaucous gull, iceland gull, common guillemot, eider duck.
Wildlife encountered today:
The Humpback Whale is quite spectacular undergoing the longest migration of any mammal (5176miles/8334km one way), attracting females by singing to them and of course their energetic nature. On many occasions humpbacks have been seen breaching, tail slapping, fin slapping, blowing bubbles and spy hopping just to mention a few. The humpback is also one of the larger whales we encounter
The white-beaked dolphin is the most common dolphin found in the surrounding waters of Iceland and is seen not only in the summer but winter too usually in larger numbers, hundreds sometimes. When feeding they show energetic behaviour such as breaching out of the water and coming down with a big splash and bursts of fast swimming.
The Harbour Porpoise is the smallest and most abundant cetacean around Iceland. They are usually shy but occasionally they come and play around the boats. They can be relatively hard to spot from a distance due to their size and their abundance depends entirely on the food availability of our shores since they are opportunistic feeders.
Grey seals are generally distinguished from harbour seal by their straight head and fewer spots. Males are darker and larger than the females who tend to be a silver, grey or brown in color. Grey seals and harbour seals are the only seals that have been reported breeding in Icelandic waters.