Tuesday, 22 March 2022

Today we will be operating on our lovely vessel Eldey for the 09:00 and 13:00 Classic Whale Watching tours. Make sure to dress appropriately for the tours as it is always colder on sea than on land.

• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 09:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 13:00

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. 

Report from Eldey: What a tour! Words cannot express how spectacular this tour was! However, I will try to explain. Today the sea was beautifully flat and calm, there was very little wind and it wasn't too cold. Just after only 20 minutes of sailing we encountered out first cetaceans of the tour. A pod of 5 harbour porpoises. A second sighting was about to come, a pod of about 9 white-beaked dolphins. This pod surfaced many times and each time came up in a different direction and sometimes we got spectacular close views of their beautiful white and black patterned sides. On heading out further into the bay we encountered yet another pod of about 7 dolphinsn so it was decided to take a closer look. This pod seemed to be a lot more active than the previous and surfaced multiple times. More harbour porpoises were spotted in the distance, about 5 individuals. It seems the bay was full of animals today! Suddenly, we spotted a great big blow in the distance and we went closer. It turned out to be a humpback whale! It was surfacing very slowly so we got to se the back of it and the blow a lot. After some time it showed us the fluke before going for a short dive. It did that a couple of times so we got a good look at the fluke and saw that we had seen this whale for the last weeks, now the famous known as Mariupol, great to see it again! After watching this amazing creature surface and its sonourous exhalations for sometime we began heading back only to encounter yet another pod of about 2-3 harbour porpoises. With three pods of harbour porpoises, two of white-beaked dolphins and a humpback whale we dolphfinitely had a very action packed tour, what an incredible day!

- Estel Sanchez Cami

Report from Eldey: If this morning was nice this afternoon was even better. The sea was flat as a mirror of silver reflecting the clouds. After only half an hour we start seeing small pods of 2-4 harbour porpoises. We saw probably 4 different pods of those tiny cetaceans surfacing. We kept going and start seeing almost at the same time dolphins jumping far away and a bit closer a humpback whale. This humpback was Mariupol, a whale that we have been seeing a lot those last few days. The animal was resting, swimming calmly and going for short dives, showing us its fluke several times. We could admire the whale for a while and we started heading away, in direction of a pod of 6-7 white-beaked dolphins that were coming at us. Actually they passed us and went to see the humpback! The baleen whale turned on the side and rolled on its back, swiping the water with its tail trying to hit the dolphins, doing bubbles under the surface It is difficult to know if the humpback was angry of being interrupted in its resting by the dolphins or just playing with them but it was an amazing interaction to witness. As the whale was turning on its back and moving its tail we could see that Mariupol is a male. The scene repeated several time with playful white-beaked dolphins jumping around the humpback. We decided to continue our tour a bit further away and saw plenty of white-beaked dolphin, with at some point a group that counted probably 40-50 individuals. In total there was between 80-100 white-beaked dolphins in the bay. It is amazing to see how it gets so full of wildlife. Just before we head back we had a last look at the humpback that seems to be more peaceful. After a last fluke dive we went back home very happy!

- Miquel Pons

Black-legged kittiwake, black-backed gull, Icelandic gull, herring gull, European shag, northern fulmar, northern gannet, common guillemot, razorbill, eider duck.