Tuesday, 27 October 2015

Tour at 13:00

Report from Eldey: The wind was picking up but the sea conditions were great until the very end of the tour when the swell was getting a bit higher. Although it rained on us the whole tour we kept optimistic for finding animals because of our great tour this morning. It didnt take us long to find harbor porpoises on the tour, we didnt see as many as we did in the morning tour but we could follow 5-6 of them for a short time. We then found 5-6 white beaked dolphins. 3 of them frequently came towards us and for a while they were bow riding so everyone in the front of the boat got a really good look at these beatiful animals. 2 of them kept in more distance and when the other whale watching boat arrived we saw them bow riding in front of them. Even though it was raining the whole tour and the wind was picking up many of the passangers were tough and stayed outside the whole tour and got to experience true Icelandic weather out on sea.

-Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir

Tour at 09:00

Report from Eldey: We sailed out in perfect sea conditions and amazing weather. The sky was clear so we could enjoy all the mountains around Faxaflói. It took us a little more than an hour to find the first cetaceans of the tour, those were 4 white beaked dolphins that travelled slowly around us. They seemed curious about our boat and often swam under it which made it so much easier for us to get a good look at them. After following the dolphins for a while we decided to keep on going. We soon got a call from another whale watching boat about a minke whale! On our way to the minke whale we saw 9-10 harbour porpoises, it was easy to follow these small and cute animals. While watching the harbour porpoises we spotted the minke whale coming up few hundred meters away from us. This was a minke we know well and call humpy. The minke seemed to be feeding with a flock of birds and more harbour porpoises, around 7-8 individuals. The porpoises seemed to be everywhere because we saw also many of them on our way back to harbour. 

-Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir

Birds seen on todays tours: Northern fulmars, northern gannets, common guillemots, island gulls, glaucous gull, black backed gulls, black headed gulls, eider ducks, great northern diver.