Thursday, 20 August 2026

• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 09:00, 11:00, 13:00, 15:00, 17:00, 19:30
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 9:00, 10:00, 12:00, 13:00, 15:00, 16:00, 19:00

Today's Whale Watching tours from Reykjavík are on schedule as shown above! Remember to dress according to weather and feel free to borrow our thermal overalls if needed!

Report from Eldey: On this cloudy morning, we went out to sea, exploring Faxaflói Bay for another day, hoping to find some cetaceans. Our tour started with a very shy minke whale. It remained underwater for quite a while, so we decided to continue sailing. After a bit, we spotted our first blow in the distance. A solitary humpback whale was in the area! This individual was making very quick surfaces, breathing once or twice before diving again and showing us its fluke. By observing its beautiful tail, we were able to identify the individual. Its name was Hooker, due to the hook-shaped dorsal fin. This wale visited our bay in 2025 as well. So nice to have it back! After being a while with this individual we continued our journey and suddenly another humpback whale appeared at the surface. This whale was spending much more time under the surface. As it seemed busy, we decided to move on from this one quite quickly and started following new information. We started moving closer to shore and on our way we spotted two more minke whales and a pod of around 5 harbour porpoises. We we excited to spot so much wildlife out there! Our final sighting on this trip, was another humpback whale that was incredibly close to shore. We encountered it between port and the island of Videy. This whale was lunge-feeding in only 7 metres deep water. Seeing a whale this close to shore is definetly a rare sight around here and the highlight of our trip!

- Hannah Carstens

Report from Hafsúlan: This morning we had an unexpected tour! Basically, every time we found a whale, it was a big surprise for us. First, not even 3 minutes after we left the harbour, we spotted a blow! There was a humpback whale lunge feeding very actively super close to the seaside of Reykjavík! It is not very common for them to be there so close during the summer, so we took our time when admiring this whale lunge feeding and swimming in front of our bow. We then continued out into the bay, and after a while, we spotted a minke whale in the distance. As we approached, this minke decided to come close to us! It was about 2 meters from our vessel, surrounding us for a long time, super curious! We were all in awe, having the most amazing encounter with a minke whale ever! It's not often that we have minkes so interested in boats, so it was a beautiful encounter. We continued sailing until we spotted two blows in the distance. These belonged to humpback whales, and we decided to head over to the one closer to us. This individual decided to breach before we were even near to it! When we got closer, we recognize it straight away: her name was Neila, a female humpback that we have seen over the summers! After spending a short time with her, we saw we were running out of time and decided to head back to Reykjavík, super happy with such an incredible tour!

- Orsi Stipsicz

Report from Eldey: The overcast sky and calm seas due to just a little breeze from the west, made for perfect conditions. Just outside of the harbor we spotted the first humpback whale! Normally found further out at sea, this giant followed its food all the way into the bay and close to shore. We got some great impressions of its massive size as it surfaced mere meters away from our boat while lunge feeding on the abundant small fish. After some time we went on around the islands and out to sea. After a nice tour along the coast we returned back to Reykjavik with another short stop near the humpback whale we spotted earlier and that was still busy filling up its fat reserves.

- Maja Andersson  

Report from Hafsúlan: This lovely afternoon, we bundled up in the red overalls and headed out onto the bay. Or rather, we would have, were it not for the humpback whale feeding right outside the harbour walls! Naturally, we couldn't head out without checking this very busy whale out, so we got to see the end of some lunges and some very dives from this whale, before the tour had really even started! Once we were truly on our way out into the bay, we spotted the head of a curious little grey seal peaking above the water, taking a nice look at us. We continued on, and soon spotted a blow ahead of us, the second humpback of our tour. As we made our way over, we also spotted a minke whale that was heading the opposite direction of us, and once we arrived near this second humpback there was also a second minke whale making brief appearances in the background. We stayed with this lovely humpback and admired many beautiful fluke dives. Soon, we had our eyes on some dark backs in the distance, we saw 2 more minke whales ahead. As we headed closer, one of them surfaced right in front of our boat, we even got to see the minke mittens (pectoral bands) through the surface! The second one was a bit further, but we got to see it surface a couple of times. As we were quite far out, we began making our way back towards Reykjavík. As we got closer to the islands surrounding the harbour, we spotted 2 more minke whales as well as some harbour porpoises! On our way back into the harbour, we even got to see the first humpback whale we saw on this tour, apparently still hanging out near the harbour entrance. What a wonderful afternoon!

- Milla Silveira

Atlantic puffin, Arctic tern, Northern fulmar, Northern gannet, greater and lesser black-backed gull, herring gull, bllack-legged kittiwake

Report from Eldey: The lovely conditions continued in the evening, and just as we left the harbour, we spotted the hungry humpback whale from the tour before. We stopped here and enjoyed the view as the whale was very busy lunging for the abundance of fish around. At one point it surfaced just in front of the sun voyager and Hallgrimskirkja, which gave opportunity for some postcard-worthy photographs. After some time here, we continued on our adventure to soon spot a minke whale. We could follow this individual for some time, and enjoyed the views of it surfacing close by. Not far away we were lucky to find another minke whale. This individual was seemingly busy feeding, and at one point it curiously approached our boat, gazing up through the surface and showing of its white belly and lovely white "mittens". Everyone was thrilled about this close encounter of a species that generally is quite shy to boats. We headed back towards the direction of Reykjavik, and had a sweet brief encounter with 4 harbour porpoises, and then we were lucky to have another look of the humpback whale that was feeding by the harbour. When we arrived, the whale had unfortunately made it into the harbour, but luckily just after a couple of surfaces it speedily travelled out again, huh phju! We arrived back full of smiles, after many close encounters on calm seas.

- Knut Albrecht