We dived Scapa flow in autumn 1984, just after returning from our tandem trip to Egypt, and still recuperating from our hepatitis. The Salford BSAC club planned it and we could not resist. We needed new wet suits because we had lost so much weight, and we hired our gear as the rest of our stuff was already en route to South Africa.

Miraculously the weather was sunny, temperature 16° and only 2 km/hr of wind. The surface conditions were flat and the water temperature at the surface 12°. Underwater visibility was 3 m-5m. Every Scot we spoke to told us this was weather rarely encountered in this bleak northern outpost, less than 500 miles from the Arctic Circle. We were grateful after the sun of the Egyptian desert, we may not have been able to take the shock otherwise.

We hired a small fishing boat where we slept on bunk beds surrounding a single cabin.

Because of the glut of scrap metal at the end of the war there was little interest in salvage initially. The locals complained about the hazard the wrecks posed to fishing and shipping and in 1923 four of the sunken destroyers were raised.

At about the same time, Ernest Cox, an engineer and entrepreneur became involved. He bought 26 destroyers from the Admiralty and began operations to recover them. He developed a new technique where he patched the holes in the hull, welded large pipes into the hull and then pumped air into the ships to raise them. A coal strike in 1926 nearly brought operations to a halt but he was nothing if not resourseful and he dug out the coal from the SMS Seydlitz and used this until the coal strike was over. Well that sounds familiar!

Cox eventually raised 26 destroyers, 2 battlecruisers and 5 battle ships. The remaining ships were felt to be too deep to be economical and hence the remaining 7 wrecks still around for diving today. Their infrastructure has been salvaged quite extensively

This massive battleship ship lies in 38 m of water and it is upside down. The Konig was a formidable force in her day, one of the 4 Konig class battleships in the German fleet, and was the leading ship in the Battle of Jutland, the biggest naval engagement of WW1, heading the attack . Salvage has caused a lot of damage, but many areas are still intact and recognisable. One of the salvage techniques with these upside down ships was to raise them a distance then drop them down onto their decks to break out the superstructure. This destroys and buckles the superstructure but also opens other parts of the ship, such as the engine rooms, for easier access

The Konig is one of the 3 battleships still in Scapa Flow, with a length of 148m. Because it is so completely upside down you can walk on the deck by inflating your BC and walking upside down. It takes 3 dives just to swim the length of the ship. The bottom of the hull is reached at 14m and the gangplanks at 33m

This wreck is so deep that most of the dives are planned to be decompression dives but the viz was so poor that plan was abandoned with the result that our dives were really short. Despite this, the sense of the vast hull rising out of the gloom is awe inspiring in a way no other wreck we have dived has ever been.

The second battleship is the Kronprinz Wilhelm, launched in 1914 as the Kronprinz. This battleship had a great pedigree, it engaged at the Battle of Jutland in 1916. She supported a German raid on the East coast of England. She attended the recovery of 2 German U boats and remained unscathed until she was torpedoed on the way home and had to return to dry dock for repairs. She also participated in the Russian operation Albion in the Baltic, so she came to her ignoble end after a decorated career.

On 15 June 1918 she was renamed Kronprinz Wilhelm but, just over five months later, on 19 November, she left Germany for the last time bound for Britain and her final resting place, Scapa Flow.

We did 3 dives on the Kronprinz and just managed to swim from one end to the other! It gives some perspective to the scale. 3 dives just to swim the length of 1 ship.

The flag ship of the German fleet was the SMS Kaiser. She was another decorated veteran of Jutland and Albion. In fact the Kaiser was salvaged by Ernest Cox and towed into Glasgow for scrap in 1929, but before she left the superstructure was smashed against the sea bottom releasing a large quantity of miscellaneous debris.

Using our sonar we dived on the remains strewn across the bottom. We were back in our natural element, scrabbling around the bottom looking for treasure. We found a fantastic brass blackout lantern and our Liverpudlian, and slightly dangerous, friends brought up a brass compass stand which was then dutifully returned to the deep! We all carried lifting bags of different sizes as, inspecting anything interesting at the bottom was near impossible in the silt and dark.

The SMS Markgraf is the third of the battleship wrecks remaining in Scapa. We did not dive this one because of its depth and technical challenges. Although she is well preserved, she lies upside down in 45 m of water and, on air with tables, no computers, and in zero vis, she was a bit beyond our technical and comfort zones.

The wrecks of Scapa Flow are designated as protected and nothing may be taken off them. Various artefacts are housed in a little museum in Lyness on the Island of Hoy. Many of these items represent the day to day possessions of the German seamen, pottery, postcards and musical instruments, as well as the brass fittings and fixtures of the working vessels.

At the beginning of the Second World War Scapa Flow was the scene of a daring U boat raid which led to the loss of The Royal Oak, a First World War battleship at anchor there. The British had considered Scapa Flow impregnable to U boats and were caught off guard. 835 men died with the ship, 135 of them boy seamen, not yet 18 years old, the largest ever such loss in Royal Navy action. U boat Captain Gunther Prien and his men were greeted as heroes back in Germany and he was the first U boat commander to be awarded the Knights Cross of the Iron Cross. He was henceforth known as The Bull of Scarpa Flow. His mission was so successful it was only when divers found the remains of the German torpedo that they realised what had happened.

The subsequent enquiry into the disaster found that the defences at Scapa were woefully lacking and in disrepair having not been upgraded since the World War 1. Churchill set about correcting this with the building of Churchill Barriers, concrete causeways, between some of the islands built by the Italian POWs.

After this disaster the posting of boy seamen to active battleships was largely discontinued.

The site of the Royal Oak is a war grave and diving is prohibited except for members of the British Armed Forces. On the anniversary of her loss Navy divers place a white ensign on the stern of the shipwreck. She lies upside down in 30m of water

The other significant loss of life in Scapa Flow was with the loss of the HMS Vanguard.

The Vanguard was a British battleship built during the early 20 th century. In World War 1 she was at the battle of Jutland and was subsequently assigned to patrol the North Sea.

On 9 July 1917, whilst anchored in Scapa Flow, she suffered a series of magazine explosions and quickly sank taking the lives of 843 of the 845 men aboard. The subsequent enquiry failed to determine the exact cause of the accident. Although extensively salvaged she is also a designated war grave and diving is generally prohibited.

And so with the last dive completed, we packed up our gear and headed off for the ferry back to the mainland. We were filled with wonder at our amazing experiences and still carry vivid and intense memories in our minds and hearts. Truly one of the most amazing wreck diving destinations on the planet and well worth its bucket list status. Thank you Salford BSAC for always testing our boundaries.

It is sad that after all these years many of our photos are no longer around, especially our underwater photos of this period. Not that we had the equipment or the skill to actually capture this monumental site but because it would be good to revisit how far we have come and where we have been. The pictures we took underwater were natural light and slides which have long since been claimed by fungus and decay. Oh well. I found a few website shots to give you an idea at least. Maybe you can go and make your own shots sometime!