Tour at 19:00
Report from Elding: The weather was getting better through out the day and by the midnight tour it was perfect. On this tour we saw three minke whales and thee white beaked dolphins! The first one was spotted after about 30 minutes sailing, we only saw it surface 4-5 times before we lost sights of it. Still everyone managed to get a glimpse of it as it came up close to the boat. The second minke whale our captain spotted feeding under a flock of birds. This minke seemed huge! It was by far the best minke of the tour and it was easy to photograph. The last minke whale we didn't follow as we spotted 3 white beaked dolphins almost at the same time so we decided to follow them instead. This was a nice ending for our tour before before we started heading back and our troubadour started playing music in the saloon. The sunset was stunning and definitely gave us something to admire while listening to the live music.
-Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir
Tour at 17:00
Report from Eldey: The first cetacean species we spotted on this sunny tour was the smallest cetacean species recorded in Iceland: harbour porpoise. It was a pod of 3 individuals, but we couldn't‘t have a good look at them as they weren't showing much of their bodies above sea surface, so we mainly saw splashes when they were surfacing. The second one was one pretty elusive smaller individual of a minke whale. While waiting it to surface from a deep dive, we spotted another one a bit further away. All the passengers saw both individuals surfacing few times and even smelled it twice, but they were a bit elusive, so we headed further out in the bay toward the direction where we spotted a bigger whale blow. On the way there, we changed direction as we spotted a pod of 4-6 white-beaked dolphins. They were displaying mating behaviour: fast moving, changing direction, staying very close to each other, even touching each other, jumping and tail slapping. Very interesting to see. After we left dolphins and continued further out, we haven‘t seen signs of whales any more and, as we were running out of time, we started heading back to the port. On our way back we came across another pod of 4-5 harbour porpoises, this time much closer to us and with a better view as they were showing large portion of their bodies while surfacing.
-Tena Sarcevic
Tour at 14:00
Report from Elding: We headed into the Faxa Bay fearing the rocky waves that we were starting to sense at the end of the last tour but, surprisingly, the sea was quiet and peaceful. After 50 minutes of our departure we had our first encounter with a big pod of 10-12 white beaked dolphins. Among them we could actually distinguish the presence of several calves which were jumping and leaping over the surface more than the adults.The animals seemed to be enjoying a social moment, seems they were in general quite playful and also approached the boat to play with the small waves that we were generating while sailing. We moved out leaving this animals, and about half an hour later we encountered a minke whale. The individual, quite small, was surfacing quite active and having regular deep dives, so we assumed it was feeding on the bottom. We managed to get quite a few good sights of this beautiful whale, so we headed towards the Old Harbour quite happy after encountered two of the most common species of cetaceans in the Faxa Bay.
- Alberto Alejandro
Tour at 13:00
Report from Eldey: To our happy surprise the wind had calmed down since the morning making for lovely sailing conditions. We had not been traveling too long, around 40 minutes, when we encountered our first cetacean; a lone minke whale! The first individual was only surfacing very quickly and erratically between dives, so we headed further towards a large flock of birds where we came across 2 more individuals that surfaced within 80 m from the boat. What a great view of these mysterious animals! We then turned and headed towards Hvalfjordur where some splashes had been seen earlier and spotted a large pod of 12-15 white-beaked dolphins. This group were splashing at the surface less than 100 m from the boat and consisted of mostly mothers and tiny calves coming up together! These individuals were traveling rather fast with no doubt some mission in mind, so we left them after 20 or so minutes and continue into the bay where we came across another minke whale before heading home. Some fantastic close encounters on this afternoon's tour.
- Ophelie Humphrey
Tour at 10:00
Report from Elding: The weather was nice and the sea conditions good when we left the harbour to enter Faxa Bay, but the wildlife activity was pretty quiet. It took us quite a long time of sailing West before we encountered a pod of about ten white-beaked dolphins. They were focused on their whereabouts while we followed them for a while. We left them to investigate a gathering of seabirds further out to the sea. The Northern gannets were darting through the surface and it was quite obvious that a lot of food was probably just below them. But by the time the birds dispatched no whale came to join the feast and we went back to the dolphins. They were probably as happy to see us as we were to find them back as they came playing around the boat and we could easily wonder who was watching who. After few minutes we decided to head back to the harbour and caught the glimpse of a nice minke whale which surfaced right in front of the boat!
- Rémi Bigonneau
Tour at 09:00
Report from Eldey: A little chilly out on Faxa Bay, the free on board overalls were put to use in this mornings easterly winds. White- beaked dolphins were the first to be spotted after 40 minutes of sailing, a pod of about 10 individuals and a regular dolphin we call 'sophie' amongst them. We left these and on the sail offshore to search for whales we encountered another 3 pods of dolphins, the 2nd pod of 6-8 individuals had a few calves and they were leaping and playing under and around the vessel. Must have seen at least 40 dolphins, all white-beaked on this tour. It was a long time before we found the minke whales, 2 individuals on the way home. We were thrilled to identify one to be 'Gryla' a minke whale seen since 2013. We were also lucky to see a pod of 4-6 harbour porpoises too. Had to be fast to spot these animals as they were busy feeding and chasing fish but a nice selection of wildlife this morning. Very nice.
- Megan Whittaker
Birds seen on today's tours include: eider ducks, black-backed gulls, northern gannets, common guillemots, atlantic puffins, arctic terns, arctic skua, northern fulmars, manx shearwaters, whimbrel, red-necked phalarope.
Status: RUNNING
We are sailing out from the Old Harbour in Reykjavik today. The sun comes and goes and there is some wind. There could be some movement on the boat out in Faxabay.
