13 Jun 26 - From The Biggest To The Smallest Expedition Cruise Day 4 - Visiting Shetland

The fourth day of the North Atlantic Odyssey saw us approaching the Shetland Islands. The original plan was to visit Fair Isle. I was looking forward to finally setting foot on this hallowed turf. Sadly it wasn't to be, as the harbour was being renovated and was closed to landings. Plan B was to visit Foula in West Shetland, but again that wasn't possible as the locals were advising it might be too rough to land there, due to a high Atlantic swell. Plan C was viable and it was to land on the island of Noss: one of the East Shetland Islands. Landing wasn't a problem as being on the East side of the islands, Noss was sheltered from the Atlantic swell. But it was further to sail from Aberdeen and we wouldn't arrive until late morning. This allowed time for some Seabird and Cetacean watching from one of the bridge wings.

Gannet: This looks like a First Summer individual, as the black of the wings extends all the way to the mantle, there is a lot of black in the rump and it has a pale head. A Second Winter individual will look similar, but Second Summers will have white inner wing coverts and there will be more white feathers in the rump

Bonxie: As we got closer to the Shetland Islands, we started to encounter Bonxies flying past the ship, but none were close

The distinctive shape of Noss appeared on the horizon: Noss has high cliffs on its East side which drop down to a low height to the West

A closer photo of Noss

There was a large feeding flock of Gannets at the base of the sea cliffs: Sadly, we couldn't see any Cetaceans with them

Finally, we were entering the bay by Noss and dropping anchor. During this final approach, I briefly saw some distant Dolphins, but I wasn't able to figure out what they were as I quickly lost them and we carried on sailing past them.

We sailed past the cliffs on the East side of Noss before swinging into the bay on the North side: Just to the West of the final position of the Plancius is the larger island of Bressay

This building is the office for the NatureScot team who manage Noss: Visitors can visit in the Summer by taking a short boat ride from neighbouring Bressay. We were to doing a zodiac landing on the rocky landing site

The zodiacs were dropped into the water

Looking across to neighbouring Bressay

Bonxie: This Bonxie was sitting on the water as we prepared to drop anchor

At the last minute, I decided to stay on the Plancius, when the call to go ashore came. I wasn't too bothered about landing on Noss, whereas I would have definitely gone ashore on Fair Isle or Foula. I grabbed the scope and a hot drink and went back on the top deck for a few hours to try relocating the unidentified Dolphins. But they were too far away from our anchorage and I couldn't find them. After a bit of searching, I did find a few distant Harbour Porpoises between Noss and the neighbouring island of Bressay: another Cetacean for my trip list. There were a few Arctic Terns flying by, but always a bit too far for reasonable photos.

Arctic Tern

Arctic Tern

With everybody back on board, it was time to head North. Jan decided we would have a pre-dinner cruise past the Eastern cliffs of Noss, before turning North. About ten minutes after we left the anchorage, we encountered a pod of four Risso's Dolphins. Presumably, this was the unidentified Dolphins we had briefly seen as we arrived. Risso's Dolphins generally don't interact with ships, unlike Bottlenose Dolphins, which are also likely to be in these waters.

Risso's Dolphin: This looks to be a large, bulky Dolphin with a large dorsal fin

Risso's Dolphin: It also looks typically broad-bodied in this photo. However, it's also looks quite dark, but immature Risso's Dolphins are much darker than the adults

Risso's Dolphin: This is obviously a Risso's Dolphin with the pale markings and the scarring on the body

Risso's Dolphin: Starting to dive

Risso's Dolphin: Finally, the tail appeared

Risso's Dolphin: The front part of the body looks bulky

Risso's Dolphin: This individual has a distinctive scar just ahead and below the dorsal fin. It was partly visible in the earlier photos

Risso's Dolphin: They have a high swept-backed dorsal fin

After about ten minutes with the Risso's Dolphins, we carried on towards the Gannet cliffs.

This is just part of Gannet colony on the East Cliffs

A closer photo of part of the Gannet colony: I'm glad I don't have to count the nesting Gannets. It should be possible to photograph the colony and to try to merge the photos to allow the Gannets to be counted. However, ignoring the second individual when both of a pair of Gannets are present in the photo and the non-breeding near Adult Gannets hanging around the colony, will be trickier

It was impossible to count the numbers of Gannets pairs in the Gannet colony on the Eastern cliffs of Noss. My guestimate was ten thousand, which was surprisingly close and just one hundred and eighty-six pairs short of the 2025 count. It was an impressive colony.

Gannet: This looks like another First Summer individual

Puffin

Just after we turned North, we received the call to dinner. After dinner I returned to the one of the bridge wings. On most days, we had a few Fulmars enjoying the slipstream of the Plancius. I'm assuming they enjoy the same effect that professional cyclists get by staying in the slipstream and it saves they flying energy. Every now and then, one would cruise along the length of the ship and appear very close to the bridge wing. As I was generally looking forward, I wouldn't spot the close approach of the Fulmars until it was too late to react to get some photos. Finally, I managed to get some photos of one individual coming past.

Fulmar enjoying the slipstream

Fulmar

Fulmar: A close crop from the last photo, showing why they are part of the Seabird group called Tubenoses

The evening was fairly quiet as we sailed up the East side of the Shetland Islands. The highlights were another pod of three Risso's Dolphins and a Minke Whale, as well as, small numbers of the same Seabirds we had already seen.

Minke Whale: A typical Minke Whale that I picked up at long range, which showed again as we got closer to it, before quickly disappearing

The Out Skerries Lighthouse on the island of Bound Skerry: Afterwards we passed Yell and Unst, but they were too far away for any reasonable photos

When I got back into the Observation Lounge, I found that the Assistant Expedition Leader Chloe, has set up a microscope and was introducing the passengers to her new find, a Water Bear or Tardigrade. Chloe's real passion is plankton and other micro-organisms. Water Bears are not the smallest of in this diverse group of organisms, but are surprisingly fascinating. They occur in diverse habitats including: the deep sea, fresh water, Tropical rainforests, mountain tops and Antarctica. Depending on the species, they can vary in size from 0.05 to 0.5 mm. This was the smallest organism I saw on the expedition.

Water Bear: Chloe found this Water Bear in a very small sample of weed she found on Noss and it was fun to watch it moving around as it headed for a small bit of weed to feed on

They are among the most resilient Animals known. Scientists have shown they can survive severe conditions including exposure to extreme temperatures, extreme high or low pressures, air deprivation, dehydration, radiation and starvation. They have even survived exposure to outer space. Chloe said she had a pet Water Bear at home and typically allowed it to dry out when she was going away and would rehydrate it again when she got home after a few weeks at sea. Clearly, when a large asteroid eventually hits the Earth and we have another Dinosaur-like mass extinction, the Water Bears will just shrug their shoulders and carry on surviving, as they have done for the last five hundred million years.

Water Bear: A chart showing an artistic impression of a Water Bear. She was the only person on board who maintained the Polar Bears we saw later in Svalbard, were only the second best Bears of the trip

It was time for bed, so I could enjoy an early start in the seas as we sailed North from the Shetland Islands to Jan Mayen Island.

11 Jun 26 - From The Biggest To The Smallest Expedition Cruise Day 2 - The English North Sea

The first day of the North Atlantic Odyssey saw us off the East Anglian coast and sailing North, past Lincolnshire, Yorkshire and Northumberland.

We had crossed to the UK side of the North Sea to pass up the West side of the Dogger Bank: There was a Westerly wind and the crew also said that the seas would be more comfortable on the English side. The swell was pretty light

Welcome to my home on sea days, albeit I would swap to the starboard bridge wing if the wind or glare made that a better location: I occasionally could be found in the restaurant at meal times, at the tea and coffee machines and attending mandatory briefings

With the mild temperatures and light seas, some of the passengers were watching from the lower decks

Two of my cabin mates: Luc (with the hat) and Joris

Our route to Aberdeen, where we would be joined by the rest of the British passengers: I was the only Brit who had decided to travel to Vlissingen to join the Plancius

I hadn't realised how cluttered the North Sea coast was.

This wind farm dwarfed this fishing boat: The wind farm off the Brighton coast is providing protected areas for Fish to breed and perhaps this fishing boat is taking advantage of a similar level of protection helping fish stocks by this wind farm

One of the oil platform complexes we passed

This is part of the York gas field: It's a natural gas reservoir and production facility that is about twenty miles off the Yorkshire coast

Bird wise it was fairly quiet, with a few typical Seabirds. It got busier as we passed Bempton Cliffs, but we were well outside the twelve mile territorial limits and thus we missed many of the numbers of Seabirds we would have seen had we been closer to the land.

Gannet

Gannet: The scattered black feathering indicates this is a fourth year individual

Kittiwake: Adults

As we passed the Lincolnshire coast, we saw a number of Grey Seals. Not surprising given the decent-sized colonies at beaches like Donna Nook.

Grey Seal

I was generally running the ORCA Oceanwatchers app at sea to record Cetacean and Marine Mammal sightings. At least, the Grey Seals meant it wasn't an empty day, as I only saw brief views of a lone unidentified Dolphin during the day.

Grey Seal: On views like this, they can be separated from Common Seals by having parallel nostrils

There was a good sunset at the end of the evening. Something we weren't going to see again after we left Shetland.

It was a good sunset

Zooming into the sunset with the big camera and under-exposing the photos produced some interesting post-apocalypse images

I do like these zoomed-in photos of sunsets

It had been a good first day at sea and it allowed me the time to get to know many of the Dutch and Belgium Birders on the Plancius. The next day we were due in Aberdeen to pick up another seventeen, many British, passengers.

3 Feb 26 - ORCA Canaries Cruise - Vigo: Another Unplanned Spanish Destination

We departed from Madeira, knowing we were having to divert to Vigo, Spain, rather than the planned destination of Lisbon. We spent the first day at sea in six to seven metre swells. The Captain explained the complications that stopped us getting to Lisbon. The port has a depth of not much over six metres at the shallowest point and the Spirit of Discovery had a similar draught. With the full six metre swell continuing close to the port, there was a risk that the ship could ground as we entered port. The only safe way to arrive was to enter overnight on the highest point of the high tide. While he thought we could arrive early for the overnight high tide, our departure would also be delayed to the following overnight high tide. This would have meant we would arrive several hours late in Pompey. The decision was taken we would head to Vigo instead.

Not surprising the seas were rough in the six to seven metre swell

The first day at sea was best forgot. In addition to the six to seven metre seas, the sea state was seven, which meant that we couldn't do any Cetacean surveying. However, we still stayed on deck looking, in the hope, we would at least see something. Twelve Kittiwakes were meagre pickings for my efforts from the back of deck 10. We continued to support the couple of one hour drop-in sessions each day, when passengers were able to meet one of the team on one of the lower decks for a chat about Cetaceans or Birds we had been seeing. Additionally, we were still producing the daily ORCA slides for the ship's TV system, so the passengers still would be aware of what we were seeing, even if we met few on deck.

Two of our regular passengers, Dorset-based Denise and Ian checking in with Fiona at the back of deck 10

The six to seven metre swell hadn't dropped at the start of the second day at sea, but at least the sea state had dropped to a six, which allowed us to resume surveying. We were twenty to thirty miles off the Portuguese coast. As we sailed North and came closer to the coast, the swell and sea state slowly moderated during the morning, but both still made surveying difficult. Additionally, there was still a thirty knot wind and the top decks remained closed, so we were again restricted to surveying from the back of deck 10. The highlight of the morning was I saw only the second Whale blow of the trip. There were only a couple of blows and like the first Whale, frustratingly I didn't see the body. Now we were closer to the coast, we were seeing more Kittiwakes, along with a few Gannets, Yellow-legged Gulls and distant unidentified Auks.

Gannet: One of two seen during the second morning at sea

We finished the morning's surveying with this lovely rainbow: A few minutes later it was chucking it down, but fortunately, that coincided with our lunch break

The seas calmed down a bit as we crossed into Spanish waters as we started to get closer to Vigo. But due to strong winds, we were still restricted to the back of deck 10. The highlight was when I saw a couple of Short-beaked Common Dolphins breach on the starboard side of the ship. Unfortunately, after a couple of breaches, they were too close to the side of the ship and I lost sight of them. I hoped they would come down the side of the ship, but if they did, we didn't see them. The numbers of Gannets, Razorbills, Kittiwakes and Yellow-legged Gulls picked up as we made our final approach into the Vigo estuary.

The Cies Islands lie at the entrance to the Vigo estuary: They have been a nature reserve since 1980

This large bridge spanned the estuary beyond Vigo

There were large Oyster farms in the estuary

Vigo has a large industrial port

We were finally tied up and able to go ashore

Vigo didn't look like it was going to be as attractive a city as Santander or La Coruna to walk around

The ship had laid on a couple of coach tours around Vigo and the neighbouring town of Baiona. I decided to skip these options and walk up to the Fortress of El Castro which dominated the high ground over the port. The Fortress had a park around it, so I was hoping to see a few Birds as well. Vigo is built on three surrounding hills and everywhere you go from the port seems to be a steep uphill walk. It was a good excuse to stretch the legs.

Yellow-legged Gull: This Yellow-legged Gull was hanging around tables outside a cafe hoping for some food. It is the nominate michahellis subspecies which breeds in breeds Portugal, Spain, Morocco and the coastal & inland Mediterranean from Belgium East to Poland & Turkey. The other subspecies breeds on the Azores, Canaries & Madeira

Looking back down one of the old streets

Vigo has a novel idea to help people get around the city on foot: There are currently twelve escalators in the city and more are planned. The plan is this will help encourage people to walk, rather than drive, in the city. The escalators only go uphill, so you still have to walk downhill. Some were very well designed and a lot more colourful than this one

I ran into a bird flock as I reached the woods in the park around the Fortress of El Castro. A quick bit of pishing produced a good response.

Coal Tit: This is the nominate ater subspecies which occurs from Europe to Siberia, Mongolia, Sakhalin & North East China

Firecrest: This is the nominate ignicapilla subspecies which occurs in West, central & South Europe to Asia Minor

Wren: This is the nominate troglodytes subspecies that breeds in Europe and Turkey

Robin: This is the nominate rubecula subspecies which breeds from Europe & West Turkey East to the Ural Mountains, South to North Morocco, the Azores, Western Canaries & Madeira

Chaffinch: This is most likely the nominate coelebs subspecies which breeds from Europe East to central Asia, South to West & North Turkey & North West Iran. However, it's possible it's a wintering gengleri subspecies that breeds in the UK & Ireland

The Fortress of El Castro was built in 1665 to defend the region from potential attacks by English forces. It is actually a combination of the Fortresses of El Castro and San Sebastian along with the city wall. It saw action in the Battle of Vigo Bay in 1702, when a combined English and Dutch fleet defeated a combined French and Spanish fleet. The Fortress, along with the city of Vigo itself, were captured by British forces as part of the capture of Vigo in 1719. In 1809, the Fortress was occupied by the French Imperial Army during Peninsular War, before being recaptured by Spanish forces.

The outer ramparts of the Fortress of El Castro

These three anchors commemorates the Battle of Vigo Bay in 1702: The battle was fought by the Anglo-Dutch navy and Spanish-French fleets and dozens of ships were sunk in the Vigo estuary

Old cannons within the Fortress

Black Redstart: This Black Redstart was feeding around the walls of the Fortress

Black Redstart: It is the same gibraltariensis subspecies that we see in the UK, which occurs throughout Europe, Turkey and Northern Africa

Chiffchaff: This Chiffchaff was feeding around the walls of the Fortress

Magpie: This is the melanotos subspecies which is restricted to the Iberian Peninsula

More of the outer walls

Looking at the inside of the Southern gate to the outer walls

Inside the walls

The gate on the inner Southern walls

The gate on the inner Southern walls

Inside the inner Fortress

Inside the Fortress' Northern gate

The Fortress has a good view over the port

We spent the night moored in Vigo port and I booked on the coach tour to Baiona for the following morning. I will cover that in the next Blog Post.