Thursday, 11 February 2016

Status: RUNNING

We are sailing out from Reykjavik Harbour today.The forecast predicts wind from the east and we can experience some swells.

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan and Elding: Like previous days we went out on two boats. Again very nice weather but with little more wind so it was freezing cold on the top deck. The overalls onboard kept us warm and when we traveled with the wind it was really warm from time to time. Elding was the first boat to get out in the bay. Soon a lot of feeding birds were seen. Gannets, fulmars and seagulls were all feeding in a large area. Suddenly a big blow was seen in front of us... It proved to be a MINKE WHALE, what a surprise! We usually start seeing minke whales in beginning of March when they return from their winter grounds further south. So this individual is either very early back or stayed behind in late autumn and spent the winter in the north Atlantic, very interesting. Both boats could observe this minke for a while and see the blows when it surfaced to breath and the dark body with the dorsal fin. Close to the minke we soon also found a nice pod of 2 white-beaked dolphins. After a while the dolphins became more elusive so we left them to scan the large area with all the feeding birds. We returned to harbor with a very successful day behind us. Join us tomorrow!

- Marcus and Sigurlaug

Bird species seen on todays tour include: northern gannet, northern fulmar, glaucous gull, Iceland gull, greater black-backed gull, black-headed gull, kittiwake, common guillemot, razorbill, long-tailed duck and eider duck.