The boat was easy. It had to be John Thornton's boat, MV Karin - a spacious platform for diving and a skipper who knows these waters well. It turned out that the only week we could book was the 29th July to 4th August, but that was ideal anyhow, so I went ahead and booked it.
Withing a few days I had the usual UKRS types signing up - Al, Jason, Keith L. and Digs signed up straight away followed by Steve C-T and Mike Souter. In October Brod joined the gang. Then in November Steve Chaplin joined the crew, followed by his buddy Alex. Finally in December Jack got in on the act...
After some lengthy deliberations on the best way of getting there, we decided to share transport in various cars, with Steve and Alex hiring a minibus and picking up Al and Digs on the way. Jason, Simon and I went in Simon’s Discovery, which although not the fastest thing on two wheels was nevertheless comfy and reasonably stress-free for the long trip. We left Reading at about 3:30PM on the Friday afternoon, and headed up overnight arriving at Scrabster at 6AM on the Saturday morning. I did my bit by providing the humour, with such non-PC jokes as:
Janet: "Och Dr Findlay, I've got such terrible heartburn!"
Dr Findlay: "Shut up Janet and take your tit out of the porridge"
and tuneless renditions of "Donald where's your troosers"...
A full breakfast at the nearby hotel had us feeling a bit more awake, and then about 10ish we set to finding one of the blue containers to put all the dive kit in ready for the ferry. I think our container was the heaviest of all the ones they had to carry. Twelve people each with a twinset and one or two stage cylinders each madea serious amount of kit in all. I’m glad they don’t charge for freight by weight.
The crossing was flat calm, the sea almost mirror-smooth. The weather forecast was for it to stay calm, which sounded almost too good to be true. That afternoon, after finding the Karin and loading the stuff onboard, we explored Stromness a bit and sat outside in a café having lunch. It was sunny and warm, which is most unusual for Orkney. In the evening we ate in one of the pubs in Stromness, then back to the boat to test out the bunks. Although small-ish, they were comfortable enough and in my sleeping bag I was plenty warm enough. After the long drive the night before I slept solidly, and if KL did his nightly performance I didn’t notice..
Sunday
Sunday
morning dawned grey but dry and calm. I was awoken by the ferry arriving at
8AM. Then it was up and out of the harbour and on to do the Koln, one of the
cruisers in the Flow. Down the shot we headed to hit the hull at 22m in viz
of 4-5m and water temperature of 12C. We went down the wrong side of the hull,
so we went up and over onto the other side and headed towards the bows. It
was quite dark and with the viz not easy to work out exactly where you were.
Max depth 34.5m, at 38mins I sent the blob up and we hit a total runtime of
47 mins.
After getting out of the water, we had an excellent cooked breakfast from John’s deck hand Little John. Then it was back to port for a while, before heading out to Burra Sound to do the Gobernador Bories. This is a blockship, sunk to block the entrance to the Sound. In about 15m it can only be dived on slack, and even then there is normally quite a bit of current, but there is shelter from the current from the wreck in the lee of the hull and inside. Being in the Sound, the viz is better, typically 10m, and there are plenty of fish (some of which are quite tame and like to be fed with sea urchins!). Max depth was 15.5m, runtime 42mins. It looks nothing like the picture in Diver magazine is all I can say, for a start there's a clean hole right through the middle.
Monday
Monday we headed back into the flow and dived the Kronprinz Wilhelm, one of the larger battle cruisers. The shot went down onto the hull in about 17m, then we headed over the side to find the seabed at around 38m. The wreck is upside down, so all the interesting stuff is around 36m, which is where we were until we located the stern and swam up to find the propshaft at around 22m from where we sent the blob up at around 31mins. There followed some 8mins stops at 6m and another 6 at 3m on 80% before surfacing with a total runtime of 49mins.
In
the afternoon we did the Tabarka, another blockship in Burra Sound. Again
in about 15m in excellent viz, this ship is upside down and can easily be
penetrated. Inside, out of the currents, the ship is very open and you can
make your way all the way along at two or three levels. Some found the engine
room and boilers (we didn’t), but it was certainly an exhilarating experience
either way. On leaving the ship at 37mins we put up the blob and were immediately
pulled in a high speed rollercoaster caused by the strengthening tide…
That night we headed into Stromness and had a few beers. Alasdair had a few whiskys as well. I retired slightly early, but was awoken by Al being sick in the loo next to our cabin. Unfortunately in his drunken state he'd forgotten it was a chemical loo. I feel sorry for John Thornton really who ended up emptying it...
Tuesday
Tuesday morning we decided to a bit farther afield and do the James Barrie, a trawler that sunk in Hoxa Sound in the 1960’s. Heading down the shot it was clear that the viz here was going to be good, well it was probably 15m, and still light at a depth of 43m when I hit the rocky seabed near the stern. As we were going down we encountered Steve coming up, apparently he'd had a bad case of the narcs and just wanted to get out. It just goes to show that narcosis is unpredictable I guess. Down on the seabed, the water was like green crystal, and there was quite a lot of life including some monster crabs. Jason and I swam along the deck (the Barrie is lying on here starboard side) towards the bridge, past the holds and huge deck winch to the bows. Here we turned and headed up along the port hull edge past walkways until we found the shot again at about 23mins. Of course with being on 28% and with the depth we were well into deco and stopped at 12, 9, 6 and 3m dodging jellyfish while decoing on 80% for a total runtime of 45mins. On the surface we found Al's binge the night before had caused him to throw up shortly after descending. Silly boy.
That afternoon we did the UB116 after stopping at lunchtime at Lyness for a quick look around the museum. The UB116 is a sub, quite dispersed, in about 30m on a silty seabed. Simon, Jason and I dived in a threesome this time. It was quite light on the seabed, with no need for a torch. A little way into the dive,, I was aware of a cold sensation in my left arm. Yup, I had a leak. Every time I moved my arm I got cold water seeping into my drysuit. Back on the surface the reason was obvious – the latex seal was not flat, I’d put the suit on in a hurry and had not checked it out carefully. A lesson to watch out for complacency… Max depth was 29m, dive time 33mins (and cold ones).
Tuesday night we stayed at Burray. There isn't a lot to do at Burray, just one pub and a few houses, but the food was good.
Wednesday
Wednesday
we did the James Barrie again in the morning, due to some people missing it
the day before. Somehow it was not so good the second time. Also the viz was
not quite as good either. On the way back John had suggested we all go back
up the shot, however this turned the shot line into Picadilly circus and was
not a pleasant experience. So at 9m we bagged off, but when Jason released
the blob it got caught in Petra’s Inspiration hoses and it took here a couple
of minutes freeing it. Meanwhile Jason went off onto Simon’s line leaving
me to deco peacefully on my own… Max depth 43m, dive time 45mins.
The second dive of the day was the F2 escort vessel. I wasn’t going to do this dive, as I still had a bit of a headache from the morning one (CO2 retention, maybe?) but I forced myself… It was a shallow wreck in 16m, the bows reasonably intact with a large gun that Jason insisted on sitting astride on (this was to become his party piece). Max depth 16.2m, runtime 37mins.
Thursday
Thursday was to be the big one, the Markgraf. Lying in 45m, upside down, a giant battle cruiser of 27000 tons. Down the shot we went, the hull appeared at 30-35m, then we followed the line down to the seabed. It was pretty dark down there and the viz was only 4-5m or so. We followed the wreck along the seabed towards the stern, ending up looking in thru portholes at the stern to spy a bath in the officer's accomodation area. Outside on the seabed was a toilet cistern which I found rather funny at the time (must have been narced :). Mindful of the plan we swam up the hull to let the blob go at 26 minutes and hung around decoing before surfacing, for a total runtime of around 50 minutes.
Back on the boat I was discussing plans with John when Keith L and Digs came into the cabin looking worried. Digs had got numbness in her arm. As we were already on the way back to port and the symptoms were not too severe we didn't put her on O2 but got her to the medical centre asap. There they diagnosed a potential spinal bend and put her in the pot for a 5 hour recompression schedule. Fortunately nothing too serious, but they advised her against diving for a month, so that was Scapa diving over for her...
Worse, we heard of another boat who had taken a group of divers also to the Markgraf. One of the divers had a rapid ascent from depth and was rushed to the centre, but did not make it. The Markgraf is a wreck that should be treated seriously :(
That afternoon, minus three people now, we did the Karlsruhe. Rather murky and silty, Jason insisted on doing his party trick of sitting on the gun. Max depth 26m, runtime 40 mins.
Friday
Friday
morning dawned damp and foggy again, and we headed off to do the Brummer.
A rather uneventful dive, with several people again passing this one. Jason
found another gun to sit on... On surfacing, and back on the boat, we noticed
no Alex. He'd been diving on his own, and was last seen entering the wreck
by Alasdair. We scanned the horizon but there was not sign of his blob. I
felt a deep sense of dread. Passing the shotline, however, we noticed bubbles
- the bugger had ascended the shotline and was finishing his stops! What a
relief. Max depth 33m, runtime 42mins.
The last dive was planned to be the Tabarka. On the way out to Burra Sound, a large wave caught us beam on and flung all the breakfast things around the cabin, breaking mugs and plates. Several twinsets fell off the benches, and Brod's started hissing where his MDE manifold had become twisted. My set was also bent, but fortunately no gas loss. However, the dive contingent was down to 7 now for this last dive...
That
evening, we went to the Ferry inn for a meal and a few (well, OK, several)
beers. There was a karaoke night on and Jason and Simon N-K both had a go
and managed to demonstrate that their singing was no better above water than
under it.
Saturday morning, we had to be at the ferry terminal for 8:30. All were there... except Steve CT. Where was he? We searched in vain, even looking in the harbour in case he'd fallen in the night before. We called the police, they didn't have him either... so we had to leave without him. On the way back Brod (who'd driven up with him) phoned Steve's missus and discovered he'd admitted himself to the pot on Friday night as his shoulder had felt numb.
The long drive back was assisted by the purchase by Simon N-K of a Pub Songs CD, which had all our favourites on. I expect other drivers were glad the sound of us singing was drowned by the Discovery's engine... We finally got home about 2am. Was it all worth it? I would say a definite yes. Scapa's not for everyone, it's a long way, the viz is not what people might expect (except outside the Flow), it's cold and grey and some of the best wrecks are quite deep. But if you love wreck diving then this is the place.
(c) Keith S. 2000