Kronprinz Wilhelm

The last couple of days we've warmed up on light cruisers, today we started on the battleships in Scapa Flow.

The Kronprinz Wilhelm sunk upside down, capsised by the weight of her guns when she was scuttled. Fortunately she is just slightly over to one side, so you can get under the stern (in 38m of water) to see some of the 300mm (12") guns. These guns are immense - 300mm is the diameter of the shell but at the breech end of the barrel the outside diameter must be at least three times that. The barrels must be more than 20 ft long. They are just incredibly big, looming out of the darkness.

This is the muzzle end of the port gun in number 4 turret (there were five turrets along her centerline). You can see what she looked like before she sank here.

We did two dives on the Kronprinz today, and we're moving onto the Markgraf tomorrow morning... More big guns to see!

We're diving off the Radiant Queen (also blipped here), a lovely boat - very well equpiied for divers. The skipper feeds us incredibly well too, with hot lunches and apparently unlimited supplies of cakes and biscuits.

Before each dive we get a "story" in place of the usual briefing. The skipper has dived all the wrecks herself many times, and brings them to life for us with a combination of sonar images, photographs, and sketches on a whiteboard showing us the best routes to follow to see the best bits of the wreck. Absolutely brilliant.

I must go and get some sleep now - diving is tiring work!