Text by Megan Whittaker pictures by Anna Gunnarsdóttir

Such a BEAUTIFUL day. The rain and winds over night melted a lot of the snow but plenty of ice still remained, so you have to be careful walking around the city and it is recommended to buy a pair of crampons to help out. We had almost a full boat which was nice as it is usually quiet in these parts of Iceland this time of year. The weather could not have been better, calm seas throughout the fjord and incredible light and colors of the sky and mountains. Lots to photograph. We had many birds too: little auks, common guillemots, eider ducks, long-tailed ducks, glaucous gulls. We also found a few pods of harbour porpoises, at least 3 pods of 2-3 but they were shy and hard to point out to the passengers as they soon disappeared. It was after about 1hr 40mins until we saw a humpback whale just east of Hrísey. Great whale calmly feeding, always showing the fluke when going for a deep dive. We were able to recognise this whale as 'Vladimir Spoutine' - an individual we haven't seen since July. Very interesting to see it in the winter and follow its whereabouts throughout the year. It was just a wonderful day to be out on the water in Eyjafjörður.