Searching for whales and the Northern Lights near Reykjavik

When I was looking for things to do in Reykjavik, two things jumped out at me – whale watching and seeing the Northern Lights.

Regular readers of my blog will know that I love any opportunity to see wildlife and having never observed whales in the wild or Aurora Borealis, I was keen to see if I could catch a glimpse of these two incredible natural wonders.

Here’s how I got on…

Whale watching in Faxaflói Bay

The waters surrounding Iceland are home to a host of marine life, including blue, minke and humpback whales, as well as orcas, harbour porpoises and white-beaked dolphins, which makes it an ideal place to go whale watching.

Reykjavik’s historic harbour is lined with companies running tours. These trips usually involve a three-hour tour around Iceland’s biggest bay, Faxaflói, which lies between the Reykjanes and Snæfellsnes peninsulas.

Having booked an afternoon trip with Special Tours, I made my way to the harbour in time for our departure and checked in.

As we boarded, our captain suggested we take an anti-seasickness pill, which was available free in the café, as the sea was likely to be rough.

Despite having never been seasick, I decided to take one just in case and was relieved I did.

While I was fine, a few unlucky souls were extremely ill and spent the tour with their head in a paper bag.

Bundled up in three layers of thermals and my thickest winter coat, I made my way to the top deck and was glad I’d decided to dress like the michelin man as it was pretty nippy out on the water.

Just after 1pm, we set sail, passing the yellow lighthouses of the historic harbour (above), as well as the Harpa Concert Hall (below).

Out on the water, I spent some time taking photos of the pretty scenery, marvelling at the striking cloud-covered terrain and crystal clear, light blue sea.

As we headed across the bay in the direction of Greenland, we hugged the coastline and then entered deeper waters.

Along the way, we spotted a few sea birds (above), but I spent most of the time with my eyes peeled on the horizon.

After a short while, we struck lucky and came across a small pod of white-beaked dolphins.

We spent some time watching them, which was trickier said than done, as they kept disappearing and reappearing in different places.

It was amazing to see the dolphins up close and I was surprised by how near they got to our boat.

We set sail again and as we headed further out, the sea got choppier.

It wasn’t long before we came upon another small pod of dolphins and we stopped for a bit to watch them, too.

By now, we’d been at sea for an hour and a half, and it was becoming increasingly clear we were unlikely to see any whales. It was a shame, especially as the day before they’d spotted orcas.

We started our journey back to Reykjavik, passing more dolphins and a harbour porpoise as we got near to the city.

Despite the fact we didn’t see any whales, I really enjoyed the tour.

It was a nice, relaxing way to spend an afternoon and I had great fun watching the dolphins and seeing a different side to Iceland.

Searching for Aurora Borealis in southern Iceland

I’ve never seen the Northern Lights and when I read an article in National Geographic Traveller at the start of the year that said the lights were currently at their peak, I decided to try my luck in Iceland.

Unfortunately, mother nature had other ideas and as I landed in the country, I was greeted with thick cloud and heavy rain.

On my second day, the weather forecast suggested the cloud was going to lift that evening, so I booked onto a tour through my hotel.

At 9.30pm, I was picked up from a bus stop nearby and driven to Reykjavik’s central BSI bus terminal, where we were ushered off the minibus and onto one of six coaches lined up in the car park.

Once everyone was aboard, we set off in a southeasterly direction.

Around 25 minutes later, we turned off onto a little road but didn’t get very far before we stopped and waited – with no information.

After what seemed like ages (it was a good hour), all six coaches inexplicably turned around on a couple of tiny roads in the pitch black.

Eventually we set off again, only to park up a little further along the road. By now it was almost 11.30pm.

We trooped off the coach into a lava field – which was extremely uneven underfoot – and stood waiting in the dark for the cloud to shift (this was my view, above).

It didn’t happen and at 12.25am, they called off the tour. It was disappointing, but it’s not everyday you can say you spent midnight in an Icelandic lava field.

While I was waiting in vain for Aurora Borealis to appear, I overheard one of the guides saying we were supposed to be going to the north of Reykjavik, but they’d sent a recce group ahead who’d radioed to say it was a no-go.

So they hastily changed their plans, which is why we ended up chaotically dumped in a random lava field seemingly in the middle of nowhere.

The guide was candidly explaining this was highly unusual and the tours were usually very well organised, visiting established spots near the Icelandic capital.

It was certainly an experience but it would have been helpful to have had some communication while we were on the tour. There was a lot of waiting around with no explanation as to what was going on.

With the tour over, we hopped on the coach and were driven back to Reykjavik, arriving just after 1am where I made a beeline for bed.

Info

• I booked my whale watching tour with Special Tours, which runs two trips a day from Reykjavik – one at 9am and another at 1pm: specialtours.is/