Thursday 17th August

This morning’s passengers were lucky enough to find three minke whales on their Discovery Voyage trip. One of them was the spotty one with a nick out  of its fin which we saw yesterday, and another was a really large individual. They were feeding in an area with harbour porpoises, bluefin tuna and lots of shearwaters. We also had great views of common dolphins and lots of seals hauled out on the island. On the afternoon Ocean Discovery trip, we sailed eastwards towards the area where there have been so many feeding gannets and porpoises, but it was quieter today. We did however find three groups of common dolphins throughout the trip, and also two porpoises towards the end. A highlight was the huge number of birds seen – even right close inshore there were Manx shearwaters soaring through the bay in large flocks. We also saw kittiwakes, fulmars and a Cory’s shearwater.