Wednesday, 18 June 2014

Tour at 20:30

Report from Hafsúlan: we were only about half an hour out of the harbour when the first Minke Whale of approximately 4 popped up. All were very docile and easy to watch, blows were loud and reasonably clear, and one of them even interestingly popped its head rather high up in a distance as if it wanted to have a better look at us! Perhaps it was just a steep surfacing but then, Minkes can be fairly curious cats indeed!

- Baldur Thorvaldsson

Tour at 17:00

Report from Hafsúlan: We were greeted by a little bit of light rain as we headed out into the Bay for the evening trip. But the mood on the boat was still very good and the first Minke Whale we saw was spotted by one of the many great spotters we had on board for this tour. In total we watched at least 4 different minkes. More than once they surprised us quite a bit by surfacing right in front of the boat unexpectedly! There were lots of cries of surprise and delight on this trip as the animals kept coming quite close to the boat. We even had a Harbour Porpoise porpoise in front of us for a little while. Some others were not quite as active but also came fairly close to us and gave us some nice looks at their light bellies as they brought a bit more of their body out of the water than they usually do. So apart from experiencing some typically fast-changing Icelandic weather we also got nice close-up looks at both minke whales and harbour porpoises.

- Linda

Tour at 14:00

Report from Elding: Once again we sailed straight out to where the other whale watching boats were with the 4 Killer Whales, They had travelled further offshore and changed direction. Instead of heading south west as they were on the last tour they now were heading north. We enjoyed their company for about 20-30 minutes before heading further offshore to find some Minke Whales, we found 4-6 of them, about 3-4 in the same area, surfacing close to the boat. One even looked to be circling us for a while. It was another wonderful adventure in Faxaflói Bay.

-Megan

Tour at 13:00

Report from Hafsúlan: We sailed out into a cloudy Bay and headed further south than usual - trying to catch up with the killer whales we had seen on the second tour of the morning. And even though they had been traveling very fast we managed to find the group of 4 Killer Whales! What an amazing experience to see them leisurely swimming parallel to our boat... There was a male with a huge dorsal fin, two females and one fairly small individual. We followed them for quite a while and got great looks at their beautiful patterns. But after a while we decided to head out a bit further and look for something else to see. And after a while we spotted a Minke Whale - the first of about 4-6 individuals we watched over the course of the trip. Some of them surfaced quite close to the boat and we got a nice comparison to the killer whales we had been watching earlier. Among the minkes we watched we were also able to identify "Humpie" again. And additionally to everything else we also got to look at some Harbour Porpoises (around 7-10 in total) and lots of different seabirds. What an unexpected treat and incredible trip! =))

- Linda

Tour at 10:00

Report from Elding: There was an eerie mist in the bay this morning making it impossible to show our passengers the beautiful landscape until later in the tour when the mist cleared and even the sun shone through from time to time. We sailed out into Faxaflói to our main whale watching area, 30-40 minutes from the harbour and soon found an awesome Minke Whale that surfaced just meters infront of us. Seemed to be feeding near to a flock of resting puffins, guillemots and arctic terns. This minke whale great but after a while we decided to leave it in peace and head further offshore. Soon we came across a pod of 5-7 White-beaked Dolphins which were really difficult to count as they were surfacing everywhere and always changing direction. Before the end of the tour we saw another 3-4 Minke Whales but the highlight of the tour was a pod of 4 Killer Whales, a rare sight in the bay during the summer. They were fantastic, tail slapping, sharking and surfacing altogether, 1 male and 3 females. An incredible morning in the bay today. 

-Megan

Tour at 09:00

Report from Hafsúlan: this was a good tour yet under rainy clouds. It started with some 3 Minke Whales and a single Harbour Porpoise also popped up. Then as we were heading back, a pod of Porpoises was seen porpoising, 2 further Minkes showed themselves, as well as some 5-10 White-beaked Dolphins seemingly feeding.

- Baldur Thorvaldsson