German U-Boat

Divers who enjoy visiting wrecks might find in Scapa Flow the best place where to spend a vacation. This diving destination is located in northern Scotland, on Orkey Island, and receives visitors from the entire world willing to dive into its waters. In order to reach this diving area, visitors must do so by air or by ferry.

Scapa Flow is one of the most famous wreck diving places of the world, widely known by the sunken battle ships it has. Together with the Truck Lagoon of Micronesia, they contain the biggest amount of war wrecks and sunken battle ships of the world. Both this destinations are the main places which expert wreck divers wish to meet.

The wreck of HMS Royal Oak in year 2000. Image credits http://www.resolution.ic24.net/html/royal.htm

One of the Scapa Flow's main attractions is the sunken World War I German High Seas Fleet. This fleet, composed by 5 battle cruisers, 8 cruisers, 11 battleships and 50 destroyers, was sunken on June of 1919, and most of them still remains into the water depths allowing visitors to have a close encounter with history.

Among others of the most important wrecks which divers would find in Scapa Flow we can find the battleship Markgraf, the Konig, the Karlsruhe, the Brummer and the Kronprinz Wilhem. These famous battleships are in depths which range between 24 and 45 meters into the water.

Between the months of April and October is when divers would find the best time for going to Scapa Flow and enjoy the best water temperature. During these months, the temperature of the water ranges between 12ºC and 18ºC. In winter time, such as the month of February, water temperatures might be of around 9ºC.

Underwater visibility is better during winter time, from December to March. During summer season, divers might have a visibility of between 12 and 20 m or 39 to 66 feet, and at some points it might be of 10 m or 25 ft. Natural illumination is much better during summer than in winter since sunlight rays come directly into the water and highly improve the wreck visibility divers might have, which during winter is much lower.

Author Info: by Jakob Jelling, the founder of http://www.divepilot.com Please visit his website to discover the world of diving!

The wreck of HMS Royal Oak is a designated war grave and all diving is prohibited. However other wrecks are available to the public.
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