Iceland
WiseWhale went to Iceland. And actually worked there in different places for several months or years. Iceland is a very tricky country for whale watching. WiseWhale was sitting in a meeting organised by Ice Whale, the committee in charge of organising whale watching matters in the country, and heard that sentence: « How would you like to implement regulations around whales for whale watching companies as law when the country still promotes and does whale hunting? ». This comment might be true but WiseWhale was slightly shocked that this organisation lacks the will and power to make things more ethical for an industry that clearly is growing rapidly in the country. While a voluntary code of conduct exists, it is not legally enforced, meaning that adherence varies greatly between companies. This lack of regulation results in frequent overcrowding, with one or two humpback whales sometimes being completely encircled by up to ten boats at once. Such conditions create an extremely stressful environment for the animals, disrupting their natural behavior and potentially leading to dangerous interactions.In addition to overcrowding, many operators fail to respect distance and speed guidelines, often getting far too close and too fast to the whales and dolphins. WiseWhale personally witnessed boats positioning themselves directly over whales or cutting across their paths, ignoring basic principles of responsible wildlife viewing. This disregard for proper conduct led to several alarming situations. In several years WiseWhale observed several incidents where whales exhibited signs of distress and potential aggression, including sudden breaches and head lunges just meters aways from boats and powerful tail-slapping near vessels—both of which could pose serious risks to passengers and crew.WiseWhale also witnessed on different occasions the most dreaded situation for a responsible whale watcher : hitting a whale with the boat. Some cases were accidental due to inattention or high speed in an area with whales around, but others were provoque by purposely getting too close to the animal “for the view”. In some cases injuring the whale. While some guides and captains strive to operate more responsibly, they cannot control the actions of other boats in the area. This creates an unpredictable and often harmful environment for both marine life and visitors hoping for an ethical whale-watching experience. Whale watching can be done in different places in the country and some are more famous for specific species than others. Season, years and locations may affect the amount and the species of whales observed there, which in turn will affect the behavior of the boats around. Good years with lots of whales might help in respecting the code of conduct by spreading the boats around, whereas more stressful years with fewer whales might increase the number of boats around one animal and cause the captains to be more pushy with the whales.Originally, all things started in the village of Husavik in the north of the country. This place has even been nicknamed the « whale watching capital of iceland » rightfully or not depending on season and abundance of whales. Husavik is a wonderful place to go and observe species like humpback whales, minke whales and even the all mighty blue whales. Unfortunately over the last decade even if the number of companies is only down to 4, the number of boats operating from this place is astonishing. The small bay of Skjalfandi is only 9 nautical miles wide and you can clearly understand that if the number of whales is low in the bay (1 or 2) the animals are quickly surrounded for an extensive period of the day (sometimes from 8 a.m to midnight in June during the midnight sun period). This creates some very tense encounters over the years especially between the middle of august until the middle of September due to the low number of whales in the bay at that time and high number of boats operating during high season. During the last two decades the whale watching operation spread in different areas of the country mainly Reykjavik (Faxafloi Bay), Akureyri and the surroundings of Eyjafjordur, Olafsvik and Holmavik. WiseWhale also worked in Reykjavik and went many times in Eyjafjordur and despite having a bigger area for whale watching, noticed the same lack of respect toward the code of conduct. It also went whale watching in Ólafsvík, which was better, because here there is only one single operator offering whale-watching tours. WiseWhale can only recommend being careful when going whale watching in Iceland. It is very tricky to recommend a place, or a company more than another in this case as the way the animal is approached, and the behaviour of boats there, depends highly on the number of whales available and the captain driving the boat. There is still a big problem regarding ego in this country and conquering the ocean is still a vivid mindset for most of those old fishermen doing whale watching. But Wisewhale knows also that there are some good, respectful and patient captains across the country and companies that try to improve things. Wisewhale also noticed that those improvements came thanks to critics and complaints made by customers about the behavior around the whales and can only encourage passengers to speak up (reviews, email to the company and Icewhale, talking to the captain/management) when bad behavior is noticed around the animals.