Arctic Sea Tours

22/11/2024

A very calm humpback enjoying the attention and swimming close to the surface, an amazing sight🩵🐋

21/11/2024

A pod of three Humpbacks in the beautiful weather in Eyjafjörður, what a day to be whale watching🐋

20/11/2024

You see the majestic Humpback whale in all its glory, coming close to us and checking the boat out. No engine sound just the beautiful breath of the whale and emotional passengers🐋

10/11/2024

Four humpback whales and beautiful winter colours.

09/11/2024

Snúður, aka Drogon, aka Sóley, aka Aretha Frankfin, aka Buttercup was here today and in October and in January.
Drogon - HRC-MN573 is a humpback whale that has many different names and is one of the favourite whales of
all the whale watching companies in Eyjafjörður. We will refer to it by the name its been given in
the catalogue but just for fun well mention some of the names it’s recognised as. They are Aretha
Frankfin (Akureyri), Snúður (Dalvík), Buttercup and Sóley (Hauganes).
Drogon´s fluke went through a change in 2018 which was probably the result of some sort of an entanglement. The first picture taken of Drogon in Iceland was from Akureyri in 2016 and that
same year it was also spotted in Húsavík. In pictures taken in 2018 the pattern which is so
distinctive on Drogon can be seen forming and changing until reaching its current state.
While Drogon´s s*x has not been confirmed in the past few years it has been seen in Eyjafjörður
regularly from August/September until end of February, so it seems to spend at least 6 months
out of the year just in this part of Iceland (I’m guessing it’s his favourite fjord!) but this covers the
migrational period when most humpbacks travel to the Caribbean or to Cape Verde for the mating
season, which means Drogon, who doesn’t seem to travel there anymore, as it did before is most
likely a male.
As it spends so much time in Eyjafjörður it can be seen all around the fjord, deep in the fjord close
to Akureyri or Hjalteyri, the middle of the fjord around Hrísey Island or Hauganes or a bit further
north of Dalvík, around the entrance of this beautiful fjord.

09/11/2024

Three humpback whales and beautiful colours of sunrise today. We have spotted humpback whales on 583 consecutive tours!

08/11/2024

Three humpback whales and beautiful colours of sunrise today. We have spotted humpback whales on 582 consecutive tours!

03/11/2024

Think whale season is over? Not at all! We run tours year-round, and for the past 18 months, a humpback whale has been in our area. We’re thrilled to say we’ve spotted this amazing creature on 577 consecutive tours! Join us for a chance to witness it yourself!

03/11/2024

Dalvik our hometown almost every night.

13/10/2024

At least 20 humpback whales in our area last few weeks. Great sightings, many whales in small areas. October is among the best months for whale watching in Eyjafjordur north Iceland.

08/10/2024

The light and the humpback whales are beautiful these days.

01/10/2024

Very proud moment and good for whale watching in Iceland. Our government have always blocked whale watching companies in Iceland to getting on board in the committee for the meetings in the International whaling commission. The IWC was established in 1946 as the global body responsible for management of whaling and conservation of whales. Today the IWC has 88 member countries. The mandate has not changed but many new conservation concerns exist and the IWC work programme now also includes bycatch & entanglement, ship strikes, ocean noise, pollution and debris, and sustainable whale watching. It is a change and recognition of whale watching in Iceland. Before only whaling companies had a member on the committee. Sad but true. Whale watching in Iceland is among the best in world but government in Iceland blocked us on being on the handbook of IWC for sustainable whale watching around the world. Whale watching is a rapidly growing activity, and the Whale Watching Handbook was designed to help the industry develop in a way that is sustainable in the long-term, for both the whale populations that are observed and the economies that depend on their presence.

Icewhale- Hvalaskoðunarsamtök Íslands- áttu í fyrsta sinn fulltrúa í sendinefnd Íslands hjá Alþjóðahvalveiðiráðinu á ársfundi ráðsins í Líma í Perú í síðustu viku. Í því felst viðurkenning á hvalaskoðun sem raunverulegri og mikilvægri nýtingu á hvalastofnum við landið. Fram til þessa hafa stjórnvöld hunsað Hvalaskoðunarsamtökin þegar kemur að þessari alþjóðlegu umfjöllun og ákvarðanatöku um nýtingu og verndun hvalastofna og því er þetta mikilvægt skref í rétta átt og gott fordæmi. Á fundinum vakti fulltrúi Icewhale athygli á því að þrátt fyrir að Ísland sé lang stærsta hvalaskoðunarlandið í Evrópu þá erum við ekki inni í handbók ráðsins um hvalaskoðun á heimsvísu. Hitt hvalveiðiríkið í Evrópu- Noregur- er þar hins vegar inni. Sendinefnd Íslands átti fund með sendinefnd Bretlands um það að Ísland fari inn í handbókina og er það nú komið í ferli. Augljóst er á öllu að hingað til hafa ríkin, sem aðild eiga að Alþjóðahvalveiðiráðinu, skipst í tvö horn. Með og á móti iðnaðarveiðum á hval. Vart er þó hægt að tala um tvær fylkingar í því sambandi því ríkin sem eru á móti slíkum veiðum eru öll Evrópuríkin, utan Íslands og og Noregs, vel flest Asíuríki, sömuleiðis Suður Ameríka öll, Bandaríkin og S-Afríka. Ríkin sem Ísland hefur hingað til talið hag sínum best borgið í félagsskap með, fyrir utan Japan og Noreg, eru eyríki í karabíska hafinu s.s. Antigua Barbuda, St Kitts og síðan Afríkuríki á borð við Gíneu og Togo. Á þessum ársfundi í Lima varð sú sögulega breyting á afstöðu Íslands að við hættum að greiða atkvæði í blindni með Japönum og Noregi en Kolbeinn Árnason formaður sendinefndarinnar lýsti því yfir að skiptar skoðanir væru innan ríkisstjórnar Íslands um hvalveiðar og að hvalveiðistefna Íslands væri til endurskoðunar. Það má því með sanni segja að þetta hafi verið tímamótafundur sem Hvalaskoðunarsamtök Íslands geta verið stolt af. Það skiptir máli að hafa okkur með!

17/09/2024

The most famous humpback whale of Iceland is back. Frægi aka famous aka Porcupine.
Porcupine - HRC-MN168
Porcupine's first picture in Dalvik Eyjafjörður Iceland is from early August 2012.
In November of 2014 Porcupine was GPS marked by researchers just north of Hrísey Island in the hopes of tracking it to its mating location in the Caribbean and then back to Iceland to have a full journey from feeding ground to mating ground and back again documented. Unfortunately the GPS tracker fell out when Porcupine was on its way back from the Caribbean, where it stayed around Puerto Rico for some two weeks. It made its journey from Iceland to Puerto Rico and back again in 4 months, leaving in January 2015 and being spotted again in Iceland in May that year.
We’re lucky enough to have been encountering Porcupine every year around the same time, it likes to come into the fjord late in the summer and stay during the fall months until it migrates again. Early on in the summers it has been spotted in the Westfjords but from August to November it spends most of its time swimming in Eyjafjörður, all the way into Akureyri sometimes. The chances are high that you’ll be able to see Porcupine in one of our tours from Dalvík during this period as we, not only like to show of its unique fluke markings, but as its a very relaxed humpback whale that likes to come up close to the boat and show off a bit by giving us a view of its fluke twice before going for a deep dive, we love to check it out anytime we can.

15/09/2024

September is amazing for whale watching come join us

31/08/2024

Amazing tours in August. 100% sighting success. Sixth month this year with 100% record. This year is the best in our 15 years of operation. Our area us among the most reliable and best whale watching destination in the world.

25/08/2024