Although Scapa Flow is famous for the remains of the scuttled German grand fleet, there are many other wrecks in the nearby waters.
To restrict access to Scapa Flow in both the First World War and the Second World War, old and damaged ships were scuttled in some of the entrances as deliberate obstructions to navigation. One of these block ships is the 2332 ton Gobernador Bories, built in 1882 and scuttled in Burra Sound in 1915.
On the starboard side of the wreck part of the collapsed deck rests across the starboard boiler to make a tunnel inside the hull. A water tank rests against the side of the tunnel. Various pipe work and valves project into the tunnel from the end of the donkey boiler. Light enters through breaks in the plates and triangular ends forward and aft.
With the wreck being regularly swept by strong currents, there is no silt inside and good visibility makes navigation easy. Lines are not needed for this sort of wreck penetration, but I would recommend a fully redundant air supply.
Turning aft along the side of the boiler, the tunnel breaks into the open amongst the exposed remains of the engine room. The scene is dominated by the huge block of the steam engine. The crankshaft and con rods are visible through the sides of the engine block.
From the rear of the engine, the partially buried arch of the prop shaft tunnel marks the way to the stern. Largely intact, it is obscured in places by fallen sections of deck plate and hull.
A few metres back the remains of engine room bulkhead is still upright with some large sections of pipe attached to the inside of it.
The starboard side of the hull is generally higher than the port side, with ribs projecting above the line of the hull plates. Sticking up into a strong current, such ribs are a perfect home for soft corals and anemones. From the top streamers of kelp waft in the current.
The stern itself lists heavily to starboard and is surprisingly intact compared to the rest of the ship. A visible demonstration that the ends of a ship are built to withstand much higher stresses than the parts in between,
With decks gone, the inside of the stern is a grid of ribs and pillars, with shafts of sunlight streaming in from above. Right at the top the steering mechanism is still attached to the rudder shaft.
Even at slack water there will still be some current running, so a cautious move is to drop close to the seabed before coming round the stern to view the propeller and rudder, both still intact and in place. Two blades of the propeller are buried in the shingle seabed with the hub just clear.
Following the line of the keel brings you back past the intact stern to the broken port side of the hold, where you can retrace your route back to the boilers.
Back at the boilers, the tunnel formed between collapsed decking and the starboard side of the hull can be followed forwards for 10 metres or more, almost half way to the bows, coming out beneath a pair of solid deck bollards.
The wrasse on this wreck have been fed by divers and are almost tame. They readily approach seeking a free meal and follow you through the dive.
Crossing the wreck to the port side, another swim through takes you right up inside of the bows. Like the stern, the bows are intact, but this time twisted to port.