Lovely Minkes, tiny dolphin calves and a crazy humpback
Today again several different whales visited our bay. In the morning we crossed the bay all the way to the mountains on the other side. There we found a minke, which came surprisingly close to our boat – for a short check-out! We left that whale some time after and only a two minutes boat ride away a group of dolphins surrounded us. They were all swimming in pairs: mothers with extremely tiny calves! The young ones must have been a few days old only and appeared pretty clumsy whenever they broke the surface to breathe. The mothers instead surfaced full of joy, showing off their beautiful fluke. After some time we also left them behind. On our way south, three more minkes surprised us by showing up out of the blue within short driving distances. Later on a humpback appeared in the southern part of the bay. It swam its way along the beach, then travelled into the bay - most of time swimming close to the surface - and then headed back towards the steep cliffs just outside the harbour. For some time it started to show off and breached a couple of times, lobtailed and slapped its flipper onto the surface. At the same time, another humpback entered the area in the south and swam close to the river Skjálfandafljót, where we’ve seen humpbacks showing up more and more often the past days – most of them were seen feeding.
- Sarah
Photos: Sarah Arndt
A humpback swimming along the surface whilst breathing.
Compared to their body length, humpbacks have by far the longest flippers of all whales - up to 5 metres!
