The first Humpback whale of the season!
We usually have very high sighting rates on our whale watching tours and it doesn’t happen very often that there are no whales or dolphins seen on a tour. But from time to time we have trips like the one yesterday, where we were searching a huge area for almost three and a half hours without seeing any bigger whale species. The only cetaceans that were seen on yesterdays tour were several harbour porpoises, one of the smallest whale species in the world.
Even though the porpoises are a nice sighting as well, we of course want to show our passengers some bigger animals than the harbour porpoises.
If there is nothing bigger than harbour porpoises spotted on a tour, we always offer our passengers to go out with us again for free.
Yesterday we went out with 28 passengers, some of them took the opportunity to try their luck again today – and that definitely paid off!
They were rewarded with something that we have all been waiting for: The first HUMPBACK WHALE of this season has found his way into Skjálfandi Bay and was seen on both tours today! There was already a humpback whale in the harbour of Húsavík at the end of march, but today was the first time this year that a humpback was seen on our whale watching tours.
On the morning tour at 10:00 we went out in almost perfect whale watching conditions with a really flat sea and after some searching we suddenly spotted the blow from the humpback whale, to the delight of both passengers and crew. On this tour we also saw two minke whales, just a little bit south of Lundey. On board were four people, a family from the Netherlands, who went out with us yesterday (without success) and they were of course very satisfied to have some great views of both the humpback and minke whales in their second attempt.
In the afternoon we went out with only two passengers from the Netherlands, who had also been onboard yesterday, when we only saw the harbour porpoises.
And of course we stood our promise, so we took them out again for free. The tour was pretty similar to the morning tour: We had some nice views of the humpback whale and later on we also saw three different minke whales in the area around Lundey. During the tour we also saw some jumping fish (most likely pollack), something that we don’t see every day!
Our two passengers, Judith Rietveld and Jochem Vlaardingerbroek, were really happy to see these two species. Jochem had never seen whales before in his life, but Judith had been whale watching before in Kaikoura (New Zealand). She told us that she really liked our traditional icelandic oak-boat that made it possible to get a much closer view on the whales. They are going to marry soon and of course we wish them all the best for the future!
From now on we will have two departures every day in May (10:00 and 13:30). For further information or if you want to make a reservation just call us at +354 464 4272 or e-mail us at info@northsailing.is
