TUESDAY, 12 JULY 2016

Tour at 20:30

Report from Eldey: It was warm and sunny when we left the harbour, and the fact that almost no one was wearing an overall was a flagrant clue of an amazing weather. Thanks to that, the first half of our trip was pleasant and even if it took us time before finding our first cetaceans, the sailing was an enjoyable experience. After a careful check of the bay, we spotted a minke whale. This individual was difficult to follow as it was surfacing quickly and taking long dives. We did our best to follow this whale until we felt all of our passengers could have a looks and that the animal was definitely elusive. Willing to not oppress the animal, we began to move again, hoping to find something else. In the meantime, wind picked up, and conditions became significantly more chilly. Some passengers and crew members began to wear overalls, we wanted to be in the best conditions to spot cetaceans ! Eventually, we found a small pound of 4-6 white-beaked dolphins. Mirroring the minke whale, this group was at first hard to follow, and the sea was getting rougher so it was not making it any easier. But we were patient and persistent, and it paid off when this pod became curious of our boat and started to circle around us, and surface few meters from the boat, checking on us. We could have glorious looks at those wild animals until it was time to go back home. We had a cold but smooth ride toward Reykjavik, with the midnight sun on our back and enjoying the music of our awesome troubadour Bjarni, which even included the mind-blowing participation of Jorge, one of our guide an deckhand !

- Guillaume Calcagni

Tour at 17:00

Report from Eldey: The wind had calmed down quite a bit as we left for the evening tour and the sun was shining for the entire duration of the trip. Enjoying that evening sun and the landscape we headed out into Faxaflói in search of more whales, dolphins or porpoises. We sailed along the Northern part of the bay and then took a turn towards the South where we found many large groups of various seabirds. All the feeding activity seemed very promising and it was not too long until we spotted a minke whale. Unfortunately it didn´t resurface within the area around our boat so we sailed a bit further to look at another minke. This individual was very friendly and surfaced super close to us at one point! We headed a bit further (interrupted by another minke whale on the way!) to try and take a look at some dolphins reported by another whale watching boat. Unfortunately they had disappeared by the time we got to the area, but we did see a very cute harbour porpoise and another minke whale on the way back to Reykjavík. What a lovely evening!

- Linda

Tour at 14:00

Report from Elding: The weather was still very nice when we left the harbour and the sea conditions were still good. We hadn't been sailing for a long time when we got news of a couple of minke whales so we headed there and, sure enough, saw them both. They were very elusive though and after only seeing them once or twice we lost sight of them. We had plenty of time left so we decided to head further out and see if we could find anything else. A harbour porpoise passed us but only a hand full of passengers caught a glimpse of it before it disappeared. Unfortunately we weren't confident that everyone had seen the minke whales and the porpoise so we gave out complimentary tickets. We hope that the passengers that were on this tour will be able to return and hopefully we will have better luck next time.

-Bryndís Ösp

Tour at 13:00

Report from Eldey: As with the morning tour, the weather and sea conditions were good. It wasn't too long after we left the harbour that we had our first sighting. It was a minke whale. It had been seen by another boat and had gone for a dive so we patiently waited with eyes eagerly scanning the water waiting for it to come back to the surface to breathe. It then surfaced a few times to breathe and then a second minke whale appeared. We continued watching the first minke whale which was moving around and we thought we'd lost it but thankfully it surfaced quite close to our boat and we could hear it take it's breath. We had some great sightings of this whale and were able to clearly see the colouration on its flanks. The second minke whale was now much further away and could only be seen surfacing a few times in the distance. As we had spent some time with this animal and a few other boats had now gathered to watch it, out of respect for the whale and under the rules of the code of conduct, it was time to move on and allow others the chance to watch it.

- Julia Benson

Tour at 10:00

Report from Elding: We left the harbour in very nice weather, it was sunny and warm and the sea conditions were good. We hadn't been sailing for a long time when we spotted two minke whales at the same time. One was in front of us within 30 meters from the boat and the other was behind us a bit further away. We were able to spend some time with them but they were being sneaky so when we hadn't seen them for some time we decided to move on. We had heard about a humpback whale but there were already other whale watching boats enjoying the whale. We follow a code of conduct which limits the amount of boats around each whale and we had more time so we decided to hang back and let them look at it first and then we could get a closer look when they were gone. We were far enough not to disturb the whale but close enough to see the blows. We were surrounded by seabirds as well so there was plenty to see and we even saw an air battle between an arctic tern and an arctic skua. The skua was trying to steal the tern's fish but the arctic tern wasn't having any of it! When the other whale watching boats left we moved in and the humpback whale was just resting at the surface so everyone got a good look at it. We could stay with the whale for a while and it even came within 40 meters on our side. We were running out of time and about to leave when it suddenly decided to breach! And again! It was amazing, it was so close! A tour with nice weather, two minke whales and a breaching humpback!

-Bryndís Ösp

Tour at 09:00

Report from Eldey: There was a bit of wind as we sailed out for the first tour this morning, but the swell had dropped to almost nothing so we had a fairly smooth ride all the way. We sailed far out into the bay in search of cetaceans this morning, but for a very long time the only thing we managed to find was birds... There were very many of them and most seemed to be actively feeding. We were therefore quite surprised that there weren´t any marine mammals feeding in the same area. Eventually we got word of some minke whales and started heading in the direction of the boat that was watching them. Hearing about a humpback whale close by made us take a sharp turn though and soon we were able to see the animal produce blows as it surfaced again and again. We also saw the humpback whale´s back a couple of times and even managed a look at its fluke as it went down for a deeper dive. But unfortunately we couldn´t stay with the whale for as long as we would have liked to as we were already quite late...

- Linda

Bird species seen on today tours include: northern gannet, northern fulmar, arctic tern, greater black-backed gull, lesser black-backed gull, kittiwake, black-headed gull, atlantic puffin, common guillemot, black guillemot, arctic skua, and eider duck.