Tuesday, 3 May 2022

Today we will be operating on Þruma RIB for our 10:00 and 14:00 Premium Whale tours and 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
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 10:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 12:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 13:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 14:00

Report from Elding: We had classic Icelandic weather today. Light rain and some wind made for choppy tour but we all enjoyed being out in the bay. We sailed all around Faxaflói and saw many of the incredible bird species that make their home in the Atlantic. Fulmars flew close to the boat using the updraft to conserve energy. Towards the end of our tour we caught a glimpse of 2 harbour porpoises and then followed a minke whale for a while. Although we did see these species for a little time, we offered our passengers complimentary tickets so that they could come again and hopefully see some more whales and dolphins either from Reykjavik or Akureyri.

- Emily Erskine

Report from the Ribs: The sea had been stirred throughout the evening and into the morning due to an easterly wind that produced a small wave. The main issue however was the rain. It fell hard and consistently throughout the whole tour but in the end it didn't dampen our spirits due to a great encounter with a very large humpback whale. The whale was spotted by our captain after we decided to loop towards the south to avoid the worst of the conditions, heading to an area where the whales were seen last week. The tall blow hung in the air, almost resistant to the wind swirling around which was soon followed by the exceptionally large, white fluke. The whale was unpredictable in its movements, surfaced once or twice on a couple of occasions with large shoals of fish noticeable on the depth recorder which would indicate the whale was busy feeding beneath the surface. We watched the whale complete many surface sequences undisturbed by our presence before we needed to journey home. A  second, but smaller humpback was seen as we made our way towards the city.

- Mike Smith

Report from Elding: This morning we went in the north so this morning we decided to go in the south of the bay. It was still raining but there was a bit less white caps in the sea so the visibility was pretty good. In the way out as we were going in the north of the island Akurey we saw many Atlantic puffins. We first had a sighting on 2 small groups of 2-3 harbour porpoises  that quickly disappeared. We continued and quite quickly saw a blow a few times at a few hundred meters and as we approached we saw the tail of the animal going for a dive. It was a humpback whale! We waited and saw the animal come back after only 4 minutes and show us its beautiful white and black tail again. After the third dive we were waiting the whale to come back and the friendly cetacean decided to resurface at a few meters from the bow, giving an amazing sighting to our passengers, specially to the ones on the bow that were only a few meters from it! When other boats arrived we went further looking for more sightings but we could not see anything so we went back, had again a short sighting on the same humpback than before, and we went back to Reykjavik. On the way we also saw arctic terns! We were very happy to see them as those animals just arrived in Faxafloi after one of the longest migration of the animal kingdom, coming back from Antarctica where they stay during winter. 

- Miquel Pons

Northern fulmar, northern gannet, brent goose, eider duck, atlantic puffin, black guillemot, common guillemot, razorbill, great cormorant, black-legged kittiwake, greater black-backed gull, lesser black backed gull, herring gull