Thursday 19 August 2021
Today we will be operating on Þruma RIB for our 10:00, 13:00, 14:00 and 19:00 Premium Whale & Puffin tours and our lovely vessel Eldey for the 09:00, 13:00 and 19:00 Classic Whale Watching tours. For our classic Puffin tours, and our Sea Angling tours, we use our luxurious yacht Elding II. Make sure to dress appropriately for the tours as it is always colder on sea than on land. Join us by booking online or contact us directly for more information (elding@elding.is / +354 519 5000).
✔ CLASSIC WHALE TOUR ON SCHEDULE | 09:00
Report from Eldey : Today the sky was cover in clouds and there was very little wind coming from south west. It was quite smooth on the sea with a medium swell making the boat move a bit but not enough to passengers to get sick. We first had a long circle in the bay looking for whales but only seeing very elusive minke whales two times. We could not follow them so we were continuing with optimism. Then we had information of a humpback whale very close to land, we went there and saw a very active animal that breached probably 10 times! Amazing. It was having sequences of surfacing a few times, fluke dive and breach. We stayed with it 20-25 minutes and it was time to go back to Reykjavik.
- Miquel Pons
✔ PREMIUM WHALE TOUR ON SCHEDULE | 10:00
Report from Þruma II: Faxaflói carried a leftovers from the long and slow swell from yesterday that made the ride comfortable and enjoyable. We took the south route passed Grótta scanning the surface in the search for any sighs of wildlife. We were cruising slowly when suddenly a blow was seen at the distance from one of our passengers. We got close to the sport and we discovered that a humpback whale was hanging out around the area. It took us few attempts to get close to the animal, it was taking longer dives and popping at the surface far away from the boat. Nevertheless patience allowed us to get a good couple of looks of the fluke before it went for a dive. We headed north west afterwards and we were surprise by some harbour porpoises surfacing very fast by the side of the boat for few seconds. At the same time some white beaked dolphins were spotted by a boat close by, so we decided to join and take a look at them for a while. The pod was not very big, around 5 to 8 individuals, adults and juveniles. Before leaving the area, our captain found a minke whale not far away from the dolphins. The animal was heading towards noth coming at the surface very often, even 10 times in a row. It was travelling fast but we could have a great sight of it.
> Alejandro Garcia
✔ CLASSIC WHALE TOUR ON SCHEDULE | 13:00
Report from Eldey: This tour left me very confused. Not in a bad way but somehow all the different behaviors and encounters we had were quite unusual, at least to my mind. First one was with this one humpback whale who after some erratic dives surprised us with a breach very close to the boat, like 20 meters no more. It kept doing the usual thing it was up to and after 15 more minutes with it we decided to go a bit further our into the bay, We knew there were other cetaceans in some other spots, or at least we hoped for it after the amazing morning tour we had. We did not know how accidented the encounter with I think 7-12 white beaked dolphins was going to be but after some tries chasing some fins we decided to give up on them. People got a glimpse of some of them plus a very sudden minke whale showed itself in front of the boat but left the passengers a bit disappointed as it did not come back again. Good tour nonetheless, especially the start.
- Jorge Pascual
✔ PREMIUM WHALE TOUR ON SCHEDULE | 14:00
Report from Þrauma: We started our tour on the northern side of Engey where we were still seeing a few puffins eventhough their breeding season is coming to an end. We saw 2 on the island but most were rafting nearby. We heard of a humpback whale close by but due to the amount of boats around it we decided to search another area first and come to the humpback later on when there would be less vessels. We search far and wide and saw 2 small pods of 2-3 harbour porpoises, unfortunately our search effort north was otherwise uneventful so we headed to the humpback and spent a nice 30mins with it just by ourselves. It was obviously feeding due to the constant direction change and a few arctic terns skimming the surface for the whales left overs. We got some very nice fluke photos and thoroughly enjoyed the encounter before heading back to land.
- Megan Whittaker
✔ PREMIUM WHALE TOUR ON SCHEDULE | 16:00
✔ CLASSIC WHALE WATCHING ON SCHEDULE | 19:00
Report from Eldey : This tour was quite exciting. The weather and sea conditions quite exactly the same than during all day, we had a smooth tour. We went toward south searching for the same whale than the previous tour. It was much further south, closer to the land. There was a RIB boat from Whale safari, partner of Elding, that was observing this humpback whale at a good distance of it. They just put a camera and a tag on the animal to learn more about those mysterious creatures. The team of scientist was patiently waiting to see if the camera was falling after a few hours. We could observe the whale with the devices on its back feeding quietly, many birds were waiting the whale to surface trying to catch some fish escaping the mouth of the giant. We stayed there for while, following the whale that brought us even more south, so we had to turn back to go home. During the way back the volcano activated and we could see the lava from far away. A very interesting evening tour !
- Miquel Pons
Bird Species ID´d today: Northern Gannet, Atlantic Puffin, Common Guillemot, Arctic tern, Arctic skua, Northern Fulmar, Kittiwake, Eider Duck, great-black backed gull, lesser black-backed gull, herring gull, red necked phalaropes.
COVID-19: Keep in mind that passengers and crew are asked to ensure their own hygiene and safety at all times. Washing hands thoroughly with soap and using a hand sanitiser is advised. Masks are not mandatory but are recommended in areas where keeping distance from others is not possible.