Thursday, 5 July 2012

Tour at 20:30

Report from Elding: What a night! After visiting the puffins in Akurey we headed out to search for the whales. When we were sailing out we could feel that something was in the air...and in only few minutes we got one proof of it! A BREACHING MINKE WHALE! This was just unbelievable as it breached aprox 15 times in a row rather close to the boat! We were all speechless (including the guide and that does not happen very often!) After a while with this amazing minke whale we headed further out. As we were all still shaking after this very nice moment we saw another huge splash in a distance! And again another breaching minke whale! What was going on in Faxaflói? Again we just stayed there and watched this beautiful animal breach out of the water over and over. Well when that stopped we headed little further out but then we really did not understand what was going on. Another breaching minke whale!! This was just too good to be true, but definitely there was something going on that we don't know about. This was just showing us how powerful nature can be and there are so many things we don't know about these amazing animals.

Tour at 17:00

Report from Hafsúlan: We started our evening tour with our puffin island Akurey and then we went further in the bay. We found two minke whales in one area but unfortunately we saw them only a few times and then they disappeared. We continued our journey looking for other whales. We saw many northern gannets (the largest sea birds in the North Atlantic) on our way. It was great to watch how they plunged into the ocean at high speed. We saw how they straightended out their bodies like an arrow before striking the water. Although it was great to watch these big birds we still were searching for our whales in the bay. Almost at the end of our tour we found another minke whale. He surfaced very close to the boat and we enjoyed him a lot. As we almost started to go back to the harbour we spotted another minke whale and also this guy was good to see.

Tour at 14:00

Report from Skrúður: Just before heading out we heard of a fin whale that had been seen out on the bay. We therefore hurried out there. The first 20 minutes after we got there we did not see much more than huge blows in the distance. But our patience paid off. Finally the fin whale surfaced properly, showing its huge back and dorsal fin! What a large animal. Fin whales are the second largest whale species getting up to 28 meters long! We kept our speed and direction and the fin whale surfaced multiple times very close to the boat and it seemed to be accompanying us out on the bay! After a while it dove down, but came up after a few minutes blowing fiercely for everyone to hear! On our way back we stopped at Akurey, the puffin island and saw lots of puffins, which had actually been far out on the bay as well. All in all a very good but yet unusual tour, since fin whales are very rare in the Faxaflói bay!

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: Our midday tour was absolutely impressive because a special guest visited our bay. On this tour we saw a fin whale the second largest animal of our planet. He was totally close to the boat and we enjoyed watching the big blows and also the massive body. It was impressive to see such a big whale. We stayed relatively long with him but than we decided to continue our journey to look for other species. We found a minke whale almost at the end of our tour. He surfaced several times and we also enjoyed this "small" guy.

Tour at 10:00

Report from Skrúður: This morning we started out at the puffin island, where there were plenty of puffins and other birds. About 10 minutes away we saw a minke whale surfacing twice in the distance. So there was something going on unusually close to shore. We headed a little bit further out to find more minke whales, probably about 8 of them showing their black back and blowing all around the boat. Some of them came very close to the boat so that you could hear their blows! After 30 minutes we decided to leave them be although they seemed to be enjoying our company. We then found about 4 or 5 groups of white beaked dolphins, including parents with their young! Very good minke whale and dolphin sightings on this tour. Awesome!

Tour at 09:00

Report from Hafsúlan: What a nice start of the day. We started our day with sunshine and a very calm sea. First we stopped at the puffin island where we saw many puffins and we could even see some birds with sand eels in their beaks. We sailed further in the bay and surprise,  surprise the whales were very close to the harbour today. We quickly found our first minke whale. We went closer to him and we were happy to see that he was not alone in this area. We had minke whales all around the boat and we counted 8 to 10 individuals there. We even saw a harbour porpoise. It surfaced several times in front of the boat. After a while we decided to sail a little bit further out and than we spotted another minke whale. It was very close to the boat and suddenly we spotted our third species of this tour - white-beaked dolphins. We saw a group of 5 to 7 individuals and they we absolutely close to the boat. One of them was even jumping a bit. It was a great start of the day and as we sailed back to the harbour we saw even two more minke whales.

Photos taken on the 14:00 tour by guide Sveinn and crew member Imma