Thursday, 27 December 2018

What an extraordinary day we spent yesterday in the fiord! It was a cold, slightly windy winter morning, and the clouds blocked the scarce light that we get in this latitude at this time of year. Nonetheless, after about 40 minutes of our departure we spotted a good old friend of us: the Humpback whale called Aretha Franklin. The individual, named after the late singer, was gently swimming towards North. Judging by the speed, the time in between dives, and the overall “lack of energy” that we observed, we judged the animal to be sleeping for almost the entire encounter. We spotted 2 other individuals, but what definitely made the tour a special one was the lovely encounter with a small pod of 3 Northern Bottlenose whales almost right at the end of the tour, when we were already in front of Akureyri. A really special winter encounter!

The night was equally special. We embarked ourselves in a special Northern Lights tour that turned to be a delightful experience. The lights showed up from the very beginning, and accompanied us for the entire trip, being specially strong around midnight. The perfect ending for a wonderful day in!

Text by Alberto Alejandro