Tour at 17:00
Elding: Full house! On this tour we spotted all four of our most common species... and then one more! In the beginning of the tour we spotted two or three minke whales. They were not very approachable and we soon headed further out to an area we had spotted with feeding birds. On the way over there we saw a group (five animals) of white beaked dolphins, who came close to the boat and swam very calmly alongside us for a while. They were beautiful to watch and could easily be seen under the surface. The weather conditions were perfect this evening, really calm sea and warm weather. We also saw a couple of cute harbour porpoises and it is always a pleasure to get a glimpse of these small whales. When we arrived at the place with the feeding birds, minke whales were surfacing all around us and it was a great moment when the captain turned the engines off and there was silence all around - interrupted only by the sound of the minke's breathing. Then we spotted a humpback whale! It's blow sounded louder than the minke's and it came very close to the boat. We were able to get a great view of the white flippers under the surface. Right before we headed back the humpack tail-slapped for a while :) Perfect! It was really great, now we had seen all four species! But when we had about 7 miles left to the harbour our engineer and a couple of our passengers yelled out that there was a fin about 200 metres from us, and it wasn't going down - it was a BASKIN SHARK! We haven't seen these since the summer of 2006 and it was great to see one again. The baskin shark is the second largest fish in the world (only the whale shark is bigger) and they are 6- 8 meters long on average but can reach a length of 12 meters. On average they weigh around 10 tonnes but can be up to 19 tonnes (!). Sharks aren't mammals like whales are, and they do not have to come up to the surface to breathe, so when they are spotted it is because they are at the surface feeding. They'll swim slowly at the surface with their mouth wide open and filter the water that is pushed through the gills. It is a filter feeder and feeds on plankton, krill and small fish... not on humans ;) It was a great sighting and made an excellent tour even better. Everyone was very excited, crew and passengers alike :)
Tour at 13:00
Report from Elding: This was a fantastic tour! We got out to the same area like in the morning ehere we found again many minke whales. There was so much life there and such good weather that we could turn off the engine to enjoy the wildlife. Beside the feeding minke whales we has two groups of white-beaked dolphins around us. Both, the minke whales and the dolphins were slowly swimming and feeding and therefor easy to watch! Today we had hundreds of feeding gannets around and it was really fun to watch them feeding!
Report from Hafsúlan: A similar tour to the one on Elding. We came to a good area where there were hundreds of Gannets feeding. We saw plenty of Minke whales around, and just stopped the boat and let the whales approach us. We also saw a big group of white-beaked dolphins towards the end of the trip.
Tour at 9:00
A great start to the day with some fantastic weather. We saw lots of Minke whales today and even one calf which stayed around the boat for a while and we could see it perfectly under the smooth surface! We also spotted a group of white-beaked dolphins, and on the way back from the puffin island Akurey, we spotted a group of harbour porpoises :)