The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 7

Dive 11. The James Barrie. 43 Metres. Bottom Gas 20/20. Decompression Gases 50% and 100%
Dive 12. The Brummer. 36 Metres. Bottom Gas 32%. Decompression Gas 100%

The morning got off to a ropy start when we ran out of coffee. David immediately experienced a fit from too low a partial pressure of caffeine in his blood system. Luckily, we were able to nab some from another location. Once everyone had calmed down, Gareth and Wilbo sat down to assist David with his planning. This was proving something of a consternation, as David's flavour of dive planning consists of "Point me in the general direction and push me off the wreck, we'll talk about the deco later". Once all the planning was done, Diane announced that she had finally figured out what Garf stands for. This intrigued me as I wasn't aware that it stood for anything. Apparently it stands for Grumpy and Really Fucked-off.

On to the dive. We kitted up and jumped in. I was diving with Howard and Wilbo but ascending alone, as we had struggled to obtain enough Helium and Oxygen the night before, so were all diving unique bizarre-o-mixes. To my delight, I could see the wreck at 20 metres, meaning there was at least 15 metres of vertical viz. Once on the wreck, I was amazed to see that the viz was limited by the ambient light, rather than particulate in the water.

The James Barrie was a 666 Icelandic Steam Trawler that foundered in Hoxa sound in 1969 following running aground in the Pentland Firth on her way to Hull. She now lies on her side in 43 metres of water, and makes for a stunning wreck as the water flooding into Scapa Flow flushes the area clear of silt. It also seems to stop some of the marine life from forming on the wreck, so the remains are remarkably well preserved.

If the Tabarka was the most atmospheric dive of the week, the James Barrie was the most fun. It's only a small wreck, and with 12 divers on it, including a photographer and three scooters, it was just a riot. Top moment was Howard Payne, doing a barrel roll, and messing it up, ending up on his back pinned to the seabed, with half a dozen divers laughing their heads off at him in the stunning viz. Scootering through the holds was amazing, as thy are well open, and, a first for me, the wreck was well lit with ambient light. I managed to get myself tied up in monofilament, but the guys told me to stop and unwrapped me with no dramas. It was just stunning, and everyone had a great time. All too soon, the time came to leave the wreck. Because I was on weird-o-mix, I had decided to take two deco bottles with me, so I ascended next to Gareth, Howard and Wilbo, so that they could watch me through the gas switches at 21 metres and 6 metres. This all went through with no issues, and the lads started playing around at 6 metres to relieve the boredom.

During the Surface Interval, the skipper tied up at Lyness, the Naval base for both WW1 and WW2. Being a military history buff, I always find this place amazing, incredibly atmospheric. The place is eerily quiet and deserted, but you can still hear echoes of the life the large base had during two world wars. Abandoned and rotting military gear lies around all over the place, and there is a small museum to be explored. At the museum is an interesting exhibition on the Royal Oak, a complex and interesting story in its own right, but enough in this context to say it brought the realities of Scapa Flow back to me.

After a couple of hours of SI and a hearty breakfast, we roped off to head back into the flow to dive the Brummer. Howard and Wilbo had decided to bin the final dive, as they had had enough, and wanted to get warmed up and packed. This left Gareth and I to do the final dive. The first moment of drama happened when Diane jumped in first, and experienced a massive suit flood. She waved frantically, and the boat came about for us to haul her out of the water. The second bit of drama happened when Gareth's twin set leaped off the shelving, shearing off the right post cleanly. Ooops. Luckily, it was just a two minute job to get Gareth out of his own kit, and into Wilbo's. And so off we jumped into the water to dive the Brummer. This is another small cruiser, and I remember it being fairly broken up. It appears that it has degraded even further in the last year. Although there are still many fantastic swim throughs, much of the plating is finely balanced on girders that look really shaky. We were lining into the wreck, and I decided that this was not the wreck to push too far, so we turned it and had a gentle 40 minute bimble, in and out of the wreck. There are still some stunning sights, with 5.9 inch guns a plenty, huge ventilator grills and winches on display. The wreck is covered in life, and is a really peaceful dive. All too soon it was time to leave the wreck. We were carrying Oxygen, so a relatively fast ascent was done up to 6 metres for the gas switch, and time to contemplate the week's diving.

Back on the boat, most people had begun packing away their kit, so Gareth and I dekitted and packed away our stuff as well. Once we had packed up the containers, we headed down the flattie bar for a few jars, and then off to the Royal Hotel for a meal. The group presented me with a brass replica of a sign for the officer's mess on the Markgraf, which came as a complete and very pleasant surprise, and then we all called it a night.

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 6

Dive 9. SMS Markgraf. 42 Metres. 45 Minutes Bottom Time. 30 Minutes Decompression Time. 21/35 and 50%
Dive 10. SMS Karlsruhe. 25 Metres. 40 Minutes Bottom Time. 8 Minutes Decompression Time. 32% and Oxygen

The visibility on the Markgraf had dropped to about 5 metres, so we took the descent carefully. Gareth led the dive, and located the hole we were after almost immediately. However, Howard felt uncomfortable with the dive and called it immediately. As it was just a min deco ascent, we let him ascend on his own, and Gareth and I, as we felt ok, decided to continue with the dive. I tied off primary and secondary ties on the outside of the hole, and we made our way into the wreck. We past the point we had gone to the other day, and turned right deeper into the wreck. It opened up into a fairly large compartment, with several entrances, so we continued tying off and made our way out of the initial entrance and deeper into the wreck. We were now swimming parrallel to the keel of the wreck, and perhaps to decks in. Passing a hatch, we emerged into a corridor which went on for perhaps ten metres before coming to an area covered in cables and broken steel. It had taken us about ten minutes to reach this point, and although we were well within the rule of thirds we had set out when making the primary tie-off, I decided enough was enough and I turned the dive. Gareth collected the tie offs for me as he swam ahead and I reeled back. We exited the wreck three minutes later and stowed away the reel with no dramas. I felt at this point the wreck no longer held any fear for me, and I had really enjoyed penetrating it, seeing areas I had not seen before. It also gave me a healthy respect for the escape we made last year - turning the wrong way would obviously had been fatal.

Outside the wreck, we swam the small distance to the bows, at which point Gareth indicated he wanted to take a couple of shots with his camera. I did the posing thing over the bows whilst he took the pictures, but these did not come out well. We decided to do a swimming ascent, so swim very slowly up the keel of the wreck, which took us from 43 metres all the way to 24 metres, giving you a real image of the scale of these battleships. At 24 metres, we called the dive, and ascended just three metres above the wreck to switch gas to 50% and shoot the bag. Talk about an easy ascent. The deco was uneventful, and back on the surface, we could see Howard on the Invincible keeping an eye out for us, so all was well. Everyone seemed to enjoy their dive, although Mary had one surreal moment when, whilst swimming INSIDE the Markgraf, she came across a green Morphy Richards Hoover. Complete with plug. Despite the jokes about deep air that were made all day she insists it was there, next to an open porthole! Cue plenty of jokes about the cleaner leaving the window open when Hoovering, thus bringing about the demise of the high seas fleet.

Back on the boat for a hearty breakfast, and Ian was having problems with the compressor. He decided to head back into Stromness where a mechanic was waiting for him. We were on tenterhooks as to whether there would be further diving for the day, but the compressor was duly fixed and Ian steamed back out to the Karlsruhe. This is a much shallower wreck, a light cruiser well broken up. I had enjoyed it was one of my favourite dives of 2005, and was looking forward to seeing it again. The Karlsruhe was another light cruiser, slightly smaller than the Dresden and Koln, and now lying shallower than the other cruisers in about 25 metres of water. This makes for a lighter dive, and is perfect for a combination of 32% and Oxygen for a really long dive.

Once again, the teams had been moved about, to give everyone experience of diving with one another. I was diving with Howard, and Gareth was diving with Wilbo. Gareth and Wilbo were going to take the scooters in and do circuits of the wreck whilst Howard and I located a suitable entrance and did the usual ferreting. Howard excelled himself, finding a couple of great entrances, that we dutifully explored, although we did not go deep into the wreck as I decided it was a little too broken up and unstable. It definitely seemed to have flattened in the last couple of years since I had first visited, which was very sad. There were several sprung plates that were whole the last time, and the bows had a distinct sag to them which were absent in 2005. This is a real shame. These fantastic wrecks will not be there for ever, and it will be a sad day indeed when they lose their distinctive shapes and start to become flattened piles of plates. Guess that's a while away yet, but it is sad to see it happening.

Gareth and Wilbo managed about 6 circuits of the wreck, having a great time on the scooters, before stowing the scooters and doing their ascent. Howard and I had a slightly different story. Howard's p valve failed, causing a massive suit flood and resulting in him calling the dive immediately. We began an immediate ascent and Howard boogied up to the shallows a little faster than me, in order to get into warmer water. As we were decoing on Oxygen anyway and only had a few minutes’ stops, this was no real drama, but I could see his hands shaking on the ascent, and we if the deco had been any longer we would have cut it short in order to get him to the surface. Back on the surface he practically leapt out of his dry suit and into some dry clothes, and much humour was derived from the cause of the failure :)

Everyone else surfaced with no issues, and everyone had enjoyed themselves. The visibility had dropped to about 5 metres, but it was fairly light in the shallows, a complete contrast to the dark, moody wreck of the Markgraf.

We had a fairly quiet evening, with the final day's diving ahead of us. There was no helium left on the boat, but luckily Just about everyone had a fill left, so we were good to go for the James Barrie. Despite Roy and Mark trying to talk me into deep-airing the Barrie as they had also enjoyed how wasted I became on it, I had decided to do it on mix so I could use ratio deco, and also because I was interested in seeing the wreck with a clear head.

There was a sneaky helium rustling run organised this evening. As the skipper had told us he had run out of Helium, Gareth threw on a twin set and walked over to the MV Valkyrie, where Hazel give him a fill. Sneaking back, he was lumbered by a non-plussed skipper who groaned that he could have done the fill for him as he had 80 bar remaining in one of the J's. In Gareth's defence, the entire boat did hear the skipper say "That's it, no more helium" earlier in the day. Hey ho.

With the plans and teams all organised for the morning, the mixes checked and kit assembled, one half of TFT headed down the pub, whilst the other had an early night. hic.

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 5

[b]Day 4[/b]
Dive 7: SMS Koenig. 39 Metres. 38 minutes Bottom Time. 24 Minutes Deco Time. 21/35 and 50%
Dive 8: Koln. 36 Metres. 45 Minutes Bottom Time. 15 Minutes Deco Time. 32% and Oxygen

The Koenig is the name vessel of her type. At 580 feet long, with 14 inch plating and displacing over 25 thousand tonnes, these battleships were truly monsters of their time. They were capable of in excess of 20 knots, and carried 10 12 inch guns to impose their will. There are three of these monsters resting at the bottom of Scapa Flow. The Koenig seems to be the least popular of the three, although it rates as one of my favourite wrecks. Today was to be a team Foxturd dive, with Gareth, Howard and I diving together, Wilbo with Roy and Mary and David Soloed. We dived in and descended to 40 metres. The visibility had dropped to approximately 5 metres. The plan for this dive was to penetrate the wreck. We all took reels with us, and searched for a suitable hole. At about 35 metres, we located a blast hole into the wreck, through which we see a variety of passageways and hatches leading further into the wreck. This was precisely the sort of thing we were looking for, so we did a flow check and calculated appropriate gas restrictions before I tied off a primary and secondary tie and started lining into the wreck. We swam for about 15 minutes, tying off wherever possible, and gradually made our way further and further into the wreck. The murky viz became clearer as we reached part of the wreck that were obviously less frequently visited, although the bottom of the corridor we were in was covered in a deep layer of rust that had fallen down and settled from the levels above. All too soon, we reached our turn pressure, and I called the dive. We turned around and began to collect the tie-offs, making our way out of the wreck. This was putting the Tech1 stuff into real practice, and we all loved it :)

Back outside the wreck, we tidied up the reel and swam slowly along the wreck, past casement gun after casement gun. There were several large blast holes leading into the wreck that looked very tempting, and everything was covered with a patina of sea life, but we did not have the gas to linger too long. Having racked up about 45 minutes on the wreck, we drifted slowly upwards along the hull until we were swimming about on the top of the wreck. We called the dive and began the 25 minutes of deco I was calling. Howard whinged about the amount of deco because his magic machine told him the average depth was shallower than I had estimated it. However, I told him to quite whinging and put up with it until it was his turn to call the deco :). The deco was uneventful, and we hit the surface on schedule. Back on the boat for surface, and a hearty breakfast, and a surface interval resting off Lyness before going in for the second dive of the day, the Koln.

The Koln is s very different story to the Koenig. It is one of the smaller cruisers, although well equipped for her time. She was bristling with guns and capable of laying mines. She had thick plating for her size, and was capable of an amazing 29 knots. Unfortunately, she is now fairly well broken up, so there are plenty of opportunities for swim throughs and wreck penetration if conditions allow. The teams had been rearranged so that Howard and I were diving together. Now this is always a little dangerous. If you consider me to be the "middle" member of team Foxturd in terms of caution, Gareth is the angel on my left shoulder, and Howard is the anti-Christ on my right shoulder. When all three of us are diving together, there seems to be a natural balance between caution and adventure. Remove Gareth from the equation and it all goes horribly wrong. All of a sudden the little evil whispers in my ear from Howard seem very tempting, and things can get a little crazy.

Sooooo, Howard and I jumped din together with the intention of spending the entire dive inside the wreck. With scooters. What could possibly go wrong?

Actually, nothing. We had a stunning dive, and all the lining in was done according to Mr Kerslake's beasting, slowly and carefully, with the line tight and secure. We located an appropriate hole and secured the scooters outside the wreck. We then lined in for maybe 5 minutes before we located a hatchway that led deeper in the wreck. We were placing tie-offs every few metres, but the visibility warranted it. Lining in like this is a slow process, but we lined in for maybe 15 minutes before turning around and coming out again. We went further into any wreck than I have been before, and it was amazing to see parts of the wreck that have not seen daylight for 90 years. Deeper inside the wreck, things become a little more preserved, and ladders and companionways are more obviously recognisable. There is more rust and sediment, as it is not disturbed, and you have to be careful as a poor fin stroke can turn 5 metres of visibility into 0. We had a fantastic time, and I could hear Howard's calm slow breathing behind me, and see his torch signals in my line of sight, so everything was well with the world. The way out was much faster, with Howard pulling off the tie -ins for me and keeping the line tight as I reeled in the line as fast as possible. Back outside the wreck and Howard and I were laughing our heads off with the fun of it. We stowed the reel and got back on the scooters.

We scootered around a complete circuit of the wreck in a few minutes, passing all the other divers on the boat. We then scootered up to the top of the wreck. Scootering over the top of the hull, we could see some large holes that looked incredibly tempting, but I just did not have the gas to think about it. I called minimum gas and we ascended to do 10 minutes of O2 deco before heading for the surface. Probably the best dive of the week for me, I was smiling all the way through.

Tomorrow was to be another penetration dive, one I was really excited about. Having located, on Monday, the hole in the Markgraf I swam into last year, the three of us were going to swim directly to that hole and penetrate the wreck, to see how far it goes......

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 4

[b]Day 3[/b]

Dive 5: Freesia. 40 Metres. 38 minutes Bottom Time. 40 Minutes Deco Time. 21/35 and 50%
Dive 6: Hessonite. 40 metres 20 Minutes Bottom Time. 20 Minutes Deco Time. 21/10 and Oxygen

Tuesday was our day for diving outside the flow. We wanted to explore some lesser known wrecks, and experience the visibility that the waters are famous for. The plan was to dive the Freesia, a little known wreck in approximately 40 metres of water. It was originally a 40 metre long trawler, sunk in 1922.

Now, this was a little way outside the flow and frankly, the weather was blowing its nadgers off. I guess the words "Natural protected harbour" didn't really register with us when we said to the skipper "Yeah we're happy to go out". Unfortunately, a later chat with the skipper revealed that he would go out even if a flaming horseman was riding next to the boat screaming" Doomed, you're all doomed" - the invincible will handle far more of a rough seas and the divers will usually bottle it before the boat has any issues. So, off for tha 3 hour steam we went, with the boat rocking and rolling. Remarkably few people were ill, but there were definitely a few people, including myself, who were feeling sub-optimal. One interesting point for me is that we passed right next to the Kitchener memorial, the memorial for the world war one general famous for the "England needs you!" posters, who died when the HMS hampshire he was on in the area struck a mine and sank in 68 metres of water. She is a protected wreck so diving is a no-no, but the history is fascinating, and it seems you can go nowhere in Orkney without an amazing story revealing itself

After a long three hours, I handed over my tech1 card to a disapproving GLOC, grabbed an X-Scooter and jumped in to solo it. It approximately 15 metres I could see the bottom clearly 25 metres below me. At the bottom of the shot line the viz was a good 25-30 metres, the water was blue rather than green, and the sands were white. I can't imagine anything better abroad. I fired up the X-Scooter and began to explore the wreck. It was fairly flat, but it was stunning to be able to see an entire wreck from one position, select where you want to go, fire up the scooter, and just be there. I was having a great laugh, although the other divers on the boat were having a more difficult time, as there was no real slack, and a very noticeable surge at 40 metres. Mary and Roy discovered the telegraph still on the wreck, but we were not equipped to lift it so moved on. There were big brass flanges lying around, enormous boilers, and plates lying on their side. Lots of life, with dead men's fingers, a few congers and lobbies, and a couple of edible crab. There was also a bent prop shaft, with the single blade of a propeller remaining. There were also some small pieces of pottery lying around.

I racked up 30 minutes on the bottom at about 39 metres, which gave me 20 minutes to do. As Gareth and Wilbo had dropped in about the same time as me, I scootered over to them, stowed the scooters, and began the ascent. Deep stops at 27 and 24 metres were followed by a gas switch at 21 metres. I also fired a bag up from 20 minutes of uneventful deco before all three of us broke the surface at the same time. Howard and David had managed to miss the wreck despite having scooters to move them around, and had done a minimum gas ascent 15 minutes earlier, so were available to help everyone get back on the boat.

Everyone was amazed by the light and the visibility, but everyone was also a little tired when they got back own the boat - apart from me. Lesson of the day was that in good visibility, a scooter is definitely a valuable and useful tool. In poor visibility, they are just a waste of time. However, when you can see for a distance on the wreck, and use the scooter as a tool to get you to a point you have already identified, they are superb. They also greatly reduce the working level when you are diving outside slack. I can see the attraction, but I just don't do enough diving in good visibility to warrant getting one.

On to the second dive.....

The second dive was a known wreck in 30-40 metres of water, which had never been located. The wreck was the Hessonite, a fishing trawler sank 80 years ago believed to be in that area, but the precise site of the wreck has never been located. We were happy to do a scenic dive, with the possibility of diving a new wreck. The teams were re-arranged for the second dive, as Gareth and Wilbo wanted to use the scooters. This left Howard and I to dive together. Howard was feeling a little tired after the first dive, so we were going to do excess amounts of O2 deco to clean him up a little at the end of the dive. I got into position at the exit, with Howard just behind me. Unfortunately, he misinterpreted a signal from the skipper and we jumped in for 20 minutes on HMS seabed. Sigh. We descended quickly, again in absolutely stunning visibility. At 35 metres of depth, with a good 6-7 metres below us clearly visible to the seabed, I levelled out - I was breathing 32% and the mix was getting a little hot for going any deeper. Howard levelled out next to me and we had about 20 minutes of drifting over a fairly bland sea. This was completely excess for the type for the dive we did, but it gave Howard some O2 time to liven him up, and I always enjoy O2 deco as it makes me feel all nice :)

Back on the surface we were first up, and in the end we were the lucky ones. All the divers who had been dropped in the right location were swept close the cliffs in quite a swell, and Invincible struggled to get close enough to them to pick them up without them swimming out a little. This meant everyone was pretty wasted by the time they were picked up, with us on the verge of jumping in and towing them out from the cliffs with the scooters. In the end everyone was safely picked up, and to our delight Fiona had cooked up a storm for us to eat. I managed to munch my way through a huge plate of food, and then, as Invincible started the 3 hour steam through a raging sea back to the flow, I said goodnight to everyone, crashed into my pit, and slept like a baby. I woke up three hours later when Ian turned the engine off :)

Plan for the next day was two deco dives, the Koenig and the Koln, another two cracking wrecks. The obligatory fettling began.....

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 3

[b]Day 2[/b]

Dive 3: SMS Markgraf. 44 Metres. 44 minutes Bottom Time. 45 Minutes Deco Time. 18/45 and 50%
Dive 4: Tabarka. 15 metres, 40 Minutes Bottom Time. 5 Minutes Deco Time. 21/10

We gassed up with 18/45 and 50% for the Markgraf Dive. Wilbo was feeling a little off colour this morning, so decided not to do the Markgraf, but Dave, Gareth, Howard and I were good to go. I kept pretty much to myself whilst getting ready, as I wasn't really in the mood for any banter, just wanting to get the wreck out of the way. I was defintiely a little tense, but did not feel unduly stressed or worked out, so decided to go ahead with the dive. We jumped in and rocketed down the shot line at 20M per minute, forming up as a four when everyone had arrived. We checked gas and time, and then decided over the hull to the seabed. We swam along the wreck, which was in good visibility but very dark, until we reached the stern, with the massive rudder still in place and very impressive. I wanted to find the hole I had swam into the previous year, which was up at the bows at the opposite side of the wreck, so we got into line and boogied along the entire length of the wreck, going through some really cool swim -throughs on the way and passing other dives, including Roy and Mary, who whose lights could be seen deep inside the wreck. They were obviously enjoying themselves :)

Reaching the bows, we stopped for a few minutes whilst Gareth took some great pictures, and the bows were a great sight disappearing into the gloom. The bows on the Markgraf are probably the best preserved of the three battleships at scapa. We lingered for only a few minutes, as I was really keen to find the hole. And find it we did. We swam along the side of the wreck and after about 2 minutes I saw a massive opening. I signalled to Dave to hold position whilst I investigated. There was an overlap of plates, so you could swim "along" the wreck, but actually just inside it, for nearly 7-8 metres, before the hole went black and became a solid wall. Just before the end of this passageway, there was an opening that led into the wreck which just opened into a massive space. I could see immediately that I had been here fore. The hole "in" must have been where I managed to swim deeper into the wreck in my panic to get out. Of course, in decent visibility, it was all too obvious how JW and I had done what we did - anyone could have. I wanted to investigate the deeper hole further, but decided that today was not the day for lining into this hole, as I had discussed this in advance with the team, and we were nearing the planned end of the bottom time. I had satisfied myself that I had put my demons to rest and the wreck no longer held any nervousness for me, so I put this down as a great dive. The plan would be to come back later in the week at which point I would line into this hole and investigate it, as on trimix it looked really interesting rather than frightening!.

When I came out of the hole and greeted the team, we were a minute or so away from calling the dive anyway, so I thumbed it. We broke into two teams of 2, with GLOC calculating the deco for one team and me running the numbers for the other team. There was a smooth ascent to 21, at which point a bag went up from either team and then we began the 30 minutes of deco. We hit the surface, at which point Howard announced he wasn't surprised people get lost in there, as it was bloody massive and dark. I went great. I had faced my demons, and the Markgraf had turned from something I had been somewhat apprehensive of, into one of my favourite wreck dives. I couldn't wait to go back later in the week.

In addition to TFT, everyone on the boat had a successful dive. Roy and Mary had spent much of their time actually inside the Markgraf, and enjoyed themselves thoroughly. Once everyone was back safely on board, we steamed off towards the Tabarka, as the wind, as promised by the skipper, had indeed died down, and conditions were improving. We did make one change to the planned week, with a decision to dive outside the flow for just one day. With the weather being so changeable, we didn't fancy risking two days being blown out, so agreed with the skipper to dive the Freesia and Tommeline, at 40 and 30 metres respectively.

The plan for the afternoon was the Tabarka.

The Tabarka was a 2624 ton steamer sunk in Burra sound as a block ship. Today, all the planking has rotten away, but the structure of the ship remains - making for a fascinating dive. Added to the open structure, the area is reknowned for it's good visibility as the flow washes the wreck through and keeps the area mercifully free of silt. This is a stunning wreck in good viz. Last year we were unfortunately forced to dive it in almost nil visibility, which removed much of the grandeur of this amazing swim through, so we really had no idea what to expect this time. This is a negative entry dive as you don't have time to mince about the surface unless you fancy diving in the shipping lanes. Or the Atlantic Ocean. So it's suck the air out of you wing, deflate your suit, and then jump in as a 12. Then get down as fast as you can to the wreck before the current takes you past it and you slam into the Doyle like wile. e. coyote. This time, when we jumped in, we could see the wreck from the surface 13 metres below us. niceeeeee. When we got down to the wreck, I immediately found an opening, and then barrelled into the wreck to get out of the current. The rest of Team Clone followed inside and we then separated into a team of two and a team of three and began exploring the wreck. The visibility was about 20-25 metres on the horizontal, and the wreck was as stunning as usual. It was a little diver soup at the beginning, but soon thinned out as people found holes to explore. I managed to weasel myself into the propeller shaft and swam along it, which was great fun. There was one part I struggled to get through, until Dave came up behind me and basically shoved me into the hole. For those that have not dived the Tabarka, this has to be one of the best wrecks in the UK. It is essentially one massive swim through, where you can see sunlight filtering through the ribs of the wreck, enormous boilers and engine room with easy access. It's basically wreck penetration for dummies, as everything is well open and accessible. It's tremendous fun, and always a highlight of a week in scapa.

Everyone had a great time, and after about 30 minutes of slack things started to pick up so we canned it. I bagged up for Dave and I and we did a nice slow ascent, covering a massive amount of ground in the ever increasing pace of the current. You could see everyone had had a great time by the smiles on the boat when everyone was dekitting. A very successful day. The next day, we were due to go out of the flow, so after a fairly pleasant meal unfortunately served by the dimmest and least experienced waitress in the universe, we decided to call it a night and head back to the boat. Howard surprised me with a cigar and malt whisky to celebrate our diving the Markgraf, which was very civilised, and then we analysed the gases and assembled out kit before calling it s night.

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 2

[b]Day 1[/b]
Dive 1: Kronprinz WIlhelm. 36 Metres. 45 minutes Bottom Time. 30 Minutes Deco Time. 18/45 and 50%
Dive 2: F2 and Barge and Bottle Run. 40 Minutes Bottom Time. 5 Minutes Deco Time. 21/10 and Stage of 32%


As usual, I was up and about at 0530, never been one for sleeping in. I went outside to see what the weather was doing at 6am and got quite a surprise. In most of the UK, we fail to recognise how lucky we are with the weather. It can be "a bit rainy", "a little overcast", or in extreme cases, "not very pleasant". In Orkney, when you open the door in the morning, the weather kicks you in the balls and headbuts you as you fall over. It then mocks you as you beg for mercy and stomps away back over the hills with the knowledge of a job well done. The weather here is strange. It can be blowing it's nadgers off one moment, and perfectly calm the next. This was the case this morning. A beautiful sunrise was interspaced with the occasional howling gale.

The skipper arrived at 0730 and we discussed the plan. He told me the weather was looking like a gale force 8. I was disheartened by this, but he assured me that this doesn't really bother the invincible, and the divers would bottle out before the boat would, so the plan was still on to do the Kronprinz. We kitted up as the boat steamed towards the big German Wrecks. No-one managed to leave themselves tied to the boat, but there was one close call, with Wilbo managing to get within 2 feet of the ladder before Fiona whispered that most divers traditionally take their fins with them when they go diving. Whoops. Things were to get no better for Wilbo on the second dive when GLOC told him that although ratio deco required no complicated dive computers, timers and depth gauges were certainly approved in the DIR ethos, and some people actually considered them fairly important to the process of calculating deco.

For those that have not been to Scapa, the Kronprinz is a World War One era battleship, the pride of the German High Seas Fleet. At 28,500 tons in weight and 575 feet in length, she was armed to the teeth with 12" guns and armoured with 12" plating. Due to the weight of her turrets (600 tons a piece) she turned over when she was scuttled and came to rest upside down on the seabed some 38 metres below. There are numerous blast holes in the hull to explore, and one can view the superstructure, main and side armaments and plenty more if you descend to the seabed and swim along the length of the ship.

The Kronprinz blessed us with about 8 metres of Viz, more than enough, especially as we had 1 metre when I dived it last year. This made for a very pleasant dive, although Dave struggled with being underweighted throughout the dive, which added to his stress levels and was noticeable in the amount of gas he consumed during the dive. The wreck is superb, and we got a good view of the 12 inch guns under the plating, on two enormous turrets. Once again, I found the sheer thickness of the armour plating lying around simply staggering, amazing when you compare this with the paper thin materials used in modern warships. These were not modern ships with high tech intelligent weaponry. These were clearly ships designed simply to both give, and absorb, enormous kinetic wallops, until one of them gave up. When compared with the almost flat rubble that makes up many of the wrecks off the South coast, these wrecks, with their 10-15 metres of imposing height above the seabed, are simply stunning.

We had a great dive, and I ran ratio deco for Dave and I. This is simple on the big ships, as you simply swim up the hull and go from 38 metres up to the 21 metre stop - still on the hull of the wreck. By he time we hit 6 metres, we could see the sea rocking and rolling above us with the heavy swell, and I could certainly feel the SMB wanting to get away from me. Because of this, we decided not to dwell too long in the shallows and got up as fast as was safely possible. The boat picked us up nice and quickly as usual. We were first up, due to Dave discomfort during the dive, so we were able to assist everyone else as they got back on the boat. The climb up Invincible's ladder can be a pain when the sea is a bit lively. Today is was a bit lively to the tune of gale force 8.

Diane got back on the boat with a grim look on her face. The neck seal had held well, but the wrist seals were "sub-optimal" - they would be redone later. Adding to the list of failed equipment was a ripped wrist seal for Nick, and a holed suit for Roy. Everyone was getting wet in the cold, but seemed to be grinning and bearing it.

The Tabarka was blown out; the skipper reckoned it would be daft to try it in the force 8 gale that was now blowing. However, the F2 and barge would be fine as it would be a little more sheltered.

The F2 was a German WW2 escort vessel. She was 249 feet in length and weighed 790 tons. She sank near Lyness in 1946. In the 1960's, a barge was being used in the salvage of the F2. Some of the machine guns from the F2 had been transferred when the barge sank right next to the F2 in a storm. Now they make an interesting double wreck, with the advantage of the fact that a diver can drift off the wrecks and onto the bottle run, an area of the flow where countless naval ships had been tied up over two world wars, and as a result the seabed is littered with detritus thrown overboard from these ships.

Dave and I jumped in on a 15 metre dive with full twin sets and a stage as well. We had a great dive, the F2 was absolutely covered in sea life, and we spent nearly half an hour inside the barge ferreting around the machine guns lying around inside. The barge is quite open and makes for a good ferret around. We watched Gareth taking photos and Howard and Wilbo playing hooligans on their scooters for a while, and the decided to leave the wrecks. We then drifted onto the bottle run and spent ages digging around. We found some great bottles to be taken home and cleaned up, and Dave kept finding abandoned dive kit, which he dutifully put in his goodie bag to clear the sea floor. He also picked up a massive lobster and a massive crab, but let them go as we had no real way of cooking them, so there was no point taking them up. We were both giggling away during the dive, having a great time. We ran up a runtime of 90 odd minutes and then called it a day as we were starting to get cold.

Back on the boat, we were the last up this time, so everyone was around to help us bring our swag back on the boat. That evening, there followed a MASSIVE fettling session. Several suits were repaired, various seals were repaired, a torch battery, and various cheaper items! No-one had dropped anything yet, but the kit seemed to be starting to self destruct! Luckily, Stromness has plenty of beer, so half the team got shitfaced whilst the other sorted out the kit and gas for the following day. Sigh.

There were two "dumb shit" moments. GLOC managed to completely bork the deco, and cut the deco two minutes short without realising it. He felt shit about it, but we had a good natter and worked our where the error had been made. Lessons learned. Dianne took the blue ribbon prize for the "dumb shit" award, by leaving a burning candle in a wooden cabin with the curtains fluttering, whilst she went for a shower. Luckily, David wandered past and wondered what the flame was for, and promptly blew it out. Doh. Everyone had a good laugh in the evening.

The plan fore the next day was something I had been waiting for. The Markgraf. We had decided to re-arrange the team for this. Gareth, David and Myself would dive as a 3, and Howard and Wilbo would dive as a 2. In the afternoon, we were planning to dive the Tabarka. This is perhaps my favourite wreck dive, so with the weather forecast suggesting that the wind and rain were going to die down by the morning; this was shaping up to be an interesting day indeed.

The Chimps Do Scapa - Part 1

[B]Part One....[/B]

The Go with the Flow 2007 Tour Trip Report

the chimps all arrived at my house on Thursday evening, to be greeted with an evening meal cooked by the fair hand of my good lady wife, and two cars to pack. We loaded the cars at my house at 10pm on the Sunday, and it was touch and go as to whether we are going to have to take three cars. As it was we had to leave 5 stages behind, leaving only ten for the 5 of us to share. We all then decided to get an early night. I checked the spare room carefully, but despite apparently drilling through the walls all night with a hammer drill, there appeared to be no damage to the room Howard was in. We could not understand it, but jumped in the cars at 0430 and began the long trip up to Scotland

The trip up to Scrabster was, as you can imagine, a riot with all the chimps in tow. Howard's car was "dragging it's arse up the motorway like a dog with worms". Gareth's was not a great deal better, and had all the acceleration of an asthmatic ant with some heavy shopping. It was especially slow when Gareth was actually driving it, and speeded up considerably when someone else got behind the wheel. Howard, as usual was driving like someone had set fire to his arse, and we made good progress throughout the day. The banter was flowing thick and fast, as was the coffee to keep us conscious after the 4am start. Travelling up to Scrabster usually forms part of the holiday, as it's a good laugh, but it is a hell of a way, 718 miles and 13 hours.

We arrived in Scrabster, where I had booked us all into the ferry inn for the night before the ferry. This turned out to be one of my better decisions as we all managed to get shitfaced with only a 1 minute walk to the Ferry in the morning. Closely following us, Diane (Ms Diane, Lady Di, Chimp Bitch) arrived shortly after, followed by the Two Nics. A fairly heavy drinking session ensued, which give that neither Dave nor I are heavy drinkers, rapidly became quite messy.....

In the morning, we all had a great breakfast, with the exception of Howard, who had spent the night apparently drilling into the walls again.

We arrived at the ferry terminal in plenty of time to greet the people from week one. I was particularly looking forward to us. We bumped into SteveS who assured us that the week1 group had had a great time, with good viz. The two groups on the boat had kept largely to themselves so there was little unpleasant politics. 3 of the week1 group had decided to bail early and gone home on the Friday night ferry, depriving us of the ability to ask them how they got on. Never mind, eh. The ferry across from Scrabster was a little lively. It was as windy as I had seen it, and the skipper of the ferry apparently agreed as he didn't go past the old man of Hoy to my disappointment, but rather went through the flow itself, past Lyness and up towards Stromness this way. As we went past the entrance to the flow, we could see the carnage out in the open sea and decided the skipper was probably wise. The chimps were getting a little out of control on the ferry - we all have a form of primate attention deficit disorder. Luckily, Diane provided a variety of toys and games, which kept the chimps quiet and out of trouble; at least until they figured out that they couldn't eat, fight or have sex with any of the toys provided. Then, once again, chimp induced carnage ensued. After giving all of toys with pure altruism, Di was rewarded with the words "are you going to take all this shit with you, or leave it here".

The weather, frankly, was appalling. Driving rain and a serious wind. Ian the skipper was there ready to greet us, and watched in amused bewilderment as we proceeded to unload a phenomenal amount of kit. 12 divers on the boat, with 20 twin sets and Christ knows how many stages and oxygen bottles. We got all the kit stowed away, and began the traditional mad fettling session. Some amusing highlights were GLOC pouring the water out of his Argon bottle prior to deciding to run his suit off his stage bottle instead, and Markosis compensating for ill-fitting twin set bands with rubber bands and duct tape. Diane was genuinely upset that someone pointed at a stage with a suicide clip on it and asked if it was hers.

One moment that amused me was collecting the "in case of emergency" forms provided by the skipper to be filled out by us all. On Gareth's some subtle editing had added the words "unfeasibly small penis" to his lists of distinguishing marks. Howard's could not be edited by the author of this piece, as he had already filled out his form with the words "my drowned and bloated carcass could be identified by my enormous schram, red and scarred".

The mandatory trips to Scapa Scuba were made to pick up low pressure hoses, fix Howard's dry suit, and pick up various shiny things. Dave and I then settled down to complete the main task of the evening, which was to change the wrist and neck seals on Diane's suit. This turned into a bit of a drama as the neck seal was a swine to get off, but the wrist seals amusing "popped off" with almost no effort, leaving no residual glue anywhere, which I found a little worrying. Howard's Salvo promptly committed suicide as the battery cables snapped off. Scapa Scuba essentially refused to touch, so Dave set about it with a soldering iron, a blow torch and a nail. Howard looked worried...