Scapa

[garethwoodruff]

Hi Folks,

I've just returned from a weeks diving with the club with Sunrise out of Stromness at Scapa and had an excellent week. The boat and skipper were excellent, although if your over 5 foot 10 you might think a hard hat was a good idea.

We got to do the usual Scapa wrecks, like the Dresden etc... but also spent 2 days out of the flow on the way to Kirkwall and return, the first day out we did a blockship which was pants on the way round (after managing to miss a 5000 tonne light cruiser (Coln) as the shot had been ripped off the wreck by a dive boats propellers ). However on the return we got to do a couple of excellent dives, the first was a 640 tonne trawler called the elegance, which had sunk a few years ago, viz of 20meters + and an excellent dive at around 35 meters to the sea bed. Second dive was a wall adjacent to a lighthouse on the east of Orkney (25m), and I hate to admit it but I got into deco on a scenic dive, 15m viz, lots of caves, overhangs and crab city.

As a typical club trip the usual incidents occured, forgetting to do up drysuit zips, weightbelts, flooding video camera housings (ouch) etc, but overall a supurb safe, fun week away.

But if your going to Scapa and want something different getting out of the flow is certainly worth considering.

G

[Juz]

Hi G,

What was the water temp please?

Juz

[garethwoodruff]

12 degrees, bit chilly at times but ok, deco stops were better when there was some sun making it a bit warmer!

[simonf]

Originally Posted by garethwoodruff

12 degrees, bit chilly at times but ok, deco stops were better when there was some sun making it a bit warmer!

12 degrees?? Bugger - looks like I'll be taking up the offer of additional undersuit and argon bottle for next week!!

Will also head the advice on different dive sites - might be useful later in the week.

Useful info - thanks

[Hazel W]

Originally Posted by garethwoodruff

if your over 5 foot 10 you might think a hard hat was a good idea....................Snikker

(Coln) as the shot had been ripped off the wreck by a dive boats propellers ). ............ Actually it was a dive ladder that caught on the shot line unlucky but it happens

But if your going to Scapa and want something different getting out of the flow is certainly worth considering...... There are many great dives both inside and out of the flow that usually get missed because clubs generally want to dive the german wrecks senic dives abound and wrecks around Orkney number in the scores .....glad you enjoyed it

G