What a spectacular day!

Flat sea, sun, a light northern breeze and …marine wildlife! lots of it! What more could we ask for?!

The day started with flats seas, sunny skies and loooots of dolphins! 😀 It was the perfect trip to understand how different species of dolphins behave so differently from each other: from the shy Risso’s dolphins, to the “indifferent” Common dolphins and extremely curious Atlantic Spotted dolphins 😀

Risso’s dolphins

The afternoon started with a great Group of Atlantic Spotted dolphins. They were very relaxed and near to the boat. It would have been the perfect time to swim with them! 😉 there were many small babies in the Group so we call this a “nursery Group” After staying quit a long time with the dolphins, we moved out further to find 2 baleen whales! They were a bit hard to identify from distance, but we know for sure that one of them was a Sei whale. We use several measures to identify species, such a head ridges, dorsal fin position, size, coloration and which parts of their body are simultaneously visible on the surface.

Juvenile Atlantic spotted dolphin showing few pseudo-stalked barnacles hanging from the flipper and the tip of the dorsal fin

Taking all this information into account, we have decided that the second baleen whale (of the 2 that were together) has been either a Fin whale, or another Sei whale 🙂

And when we thought it was over for today, the best was yet to come! We got a last minute notice that our fantastic lookouts found a group of Sperm whales! When arrived to the actual “whale zone”, it turned out to be 5 Sperm whales. They were resting on the surface like big floating trees 🙂 🙂 Then showed their head a few times while “spy-hopping”. And not only that, but in the middle of the Sperm whales appeared another Sei whale! The Sei whale was circling around our boats like it had a plan.

Group of Sperm whales including young individuals

Sperm whales

Sei whale showing a narrow notch on the trailing edge of its dorsal fin

This was not a common sight to see baleen whales and toothed whales mixed together, but sometimes we have to be Lucky, and this was it!

To finish off in a high note, we went back to see some more dolphins and Sperm whales in our late afternoon tour 🙂 It is so beautiful at this time of the year with the sun setting and the amazing orange hues in the ocean!