Reykjavik Whale and Puffin Watching Combo — Old Harbour Boat Tours

The harbour air tastes of salt and diesel; gulls wheel like small, opinionated compasses over the Old Harbour as a line of red jackets gathers under the Elding sign. Passengers step onto a compact puffin boat first, breath fogging in the sea breeze, then later board a larger vessel that pushes out into Faxaflói Bay where the water seems to think in long, slow sentences. Guides move between decks with the cadence of people who track patterns—a rise of birds, a distant spout—and they hand over binoculars like passports: a way to enter another rhythm of life.