Tuesday, 24 March 2015

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: The wind had picked up a bit since the morning tour but the sky was still clear and the sun shined beautifully. We started to head out to the area that had proven successful on the morning tour. But before we reached that area we came across another flock of feeding birds, this time it was seagulls feeding close to the surface. Like the morning tour we soon spotted our first minke whale in the area around the birds. After looking at the photographs we found out that this was one of our ´regulars´a minke whale called Midi, we have seen every year since 2008, seen on 15 different days last summer. In total we had 3-4 minkes surfacing in different directions. A pod of 2-3 harbour porpoises made a short visit close to the boat while we were watching a minke whale in the distance. We decided then to continue to the area we were heading to before, but the gannets was gone and so was the minkes. On our way back we saw a minke whale surfacing two times but in the distance. It was time to head back to Reykjavík after another successful tour with minke whales, we are glad that they are returning from their wintering grounds.   

- Marcus Bergström

Tour at 09:00

Report from Hafsúlan: We left Reykjavík harbour in perfect conditions, sun and minimum wind and swell. The beautiful weather gave us very beautiful views over the Sneafellsnes peninsula and we could even see Sneafellsjökull volcano in the distance. First we sailed towards Akranes and then headed further out in the Faxaflói bay. Soon we came across a flock of feeding gannets and the area looked really promising. 4-5 minke whales were feeding in the area and surfaced 3-4 times before going on longer dives. One of these minke whales was a ´regular´minke to this location, frequenting the area year after year from 2008. A minke whale called The Resight Guy. At several times there was difficult knowing in which direction to look, because we had 2-3 minkes surfacing at the same time. At the same time the gannets put on a beautiful show when they constantly diving around the boat. We spent some time in the area before it was time to start heading back. On our way to Reykjavík the wind had picked up a bit but overall a really nice morning tour.

- Marcus Bergström

Birds seen on todays tour include: Black-backed gulls, iceland gulls, glaucous gulls, european shags, eider ducks, northern fulmars, northern gannets, long-tailed ducks and kittiwakes.