Despite the fact that I´ve been on a few whale-watching tours in northern Norway during the winter i couldn´t miss out on the opportunity to see whales on this Iceland trip. Even though its my third visit to Iceland I’ve never been on a tour there… don´t ask me why not. Every time I go on a tour I have at least one image in my head that I want to achieve, this time it was to get nice shots of humpback flukes in the sunset light and colors. But I didn´t expect it to be that good of a time.

We set to sea and the weather couldn’t be any better with high cloud coverage and a big clear stripe just above the horizon for the sun to shine through. It didn´t take long to spot the first blows above the calm surface with almost no wind and waves. Far away at first of course but stadily coming closer. While we all concentrated ourselves on the flukes and blows in the distance we suddenly heard the unmistakable sound of a humpbacks blow just beside the old fishing vessel we were on. By the time we got to the side it was gone.

But from this point on, just like it marked the start of something, we had these four individuals all around us. “Jackpot” I said to myself and I still can´t get over the face of pure joy my girlfriend had the whole tour long. In the closing stages of our tour just at the time of sunset i managed to get more than just the shots I came for.

Against the low sun I could see a disturbance in the waters surface, it looked familiar and reminded me of what I’ve seen in Norwegian fjords. I pointed my camera towards the spot and seconds later this huge beautiful animal broke the surface with a full mouth.

I couldn´t believe my eyes nor the cameras display. It continued on swimming close to the surface for a short time before the humpback waved goodbye with its fluke.

That was what i came for.

After this incredible encounter i switched my camera off and enjoyed the rest of the show.

-Wolfgang Falter