WEDNESDAY, 2 MARCH 2016

Status: RUNNING

We will be sailing out from Grindavik today, taking our passengers by bus from the old harbour to Grindavik. Please add an extra 1 1/2 to 2 hours to your whale watching tour to account for bus transfers. The forecast predicts a little wind from the north so there could be some swell and there will be a little movement on the boat because of undercurrent. 

Tour at 13:00

Report from Eldey: Over 130-150 humpback whales! This was by far Eldings highest number of humpback whales seen in one tour. We couldn't believe we could find more animals than we had seen on the morning tour but we were so wrong. This time we went out from Grindavík and sailed around the Reykljanes peninsula and ended the tour in Sandgerði. On the whole way between these two harbors we never had a moment where we didnt see at least few humpbacks, they were everywhere. As soon as we left the harbour of Grindavík we saw blows in all directions, at least 15 individuals, we started to sail west towards the capelin and passed by 20 more humpbacks on the way. When we got to Reykjanestá where most of the capelin seemed to be we saw at least 50 humpbacks within 700 meters and 40-50 more blows were seen further out. This area was incredible, the bird life was unbelievable, huge flocks of gannets surrounded us and kept diving for fish. We saw all kinds of behavior from the humpbacks, lunge feeding, breaching, tail slapping, milling, resting, pec slapping! We had never seen anything like this! At least 30 more humpbacks were seen on the way to Sandgerði. We had about 90 humpbacks that were close enough for us to see their backs and 50-60 blows were seen further from the boat over the whole tour. 

-Sigurlaug Sigurðardóttir

Tour at 09:00

Report from Eldey: This day will go to the history of this company! But lets take it from the beginning... We sailed out from Grindavík this morning after reports from fishing boats that the capelin had arrived and with that also many whales were seen. So we were already hopeful that we would find something on this tour but we could never have foreseen what waited us. Just outside the harbor only minutes into the tour the first humpback whale was seen! And then another one... and another one... It went on like this through the whole tour! We traveled slowly from whale to whale and it was difficult not to see a humpback today! We saw big blows, flukes going down and several whales traveling together. We could sum up one of the best humpback tours (in numbers of whales probably the best ever for Iceland?) for Elding when we returned to harbor! We saw 20+ HUMPBACK WHALES on this tour and if we also includes blows far away we can double that number!!! I started the diary entry by saying this day will go to the history of Elding and surely it will because on the 13:00 tour we saw even more whales but I let Silla tell you more about that tour, here above. Join us tomorrow!

- Marcus Bergström

Bird species seen on todays tour include: northern gannet, northern fulmar, great northern diver, glaucous gull, Iceland gull, greater black-backed gull, herring gull, kittiwake, razorbill, common guillemot, ruddy turnstone and eider duck.