It was still running a little when we got to the bottom of the shot line. This wreck is a German steam trawler fitting with guns that was scuttled when Guernsey was liberated in 1945. We dropped down the port side onto the sea bed and swam towards the stern. although we were below 30 m (98 ft) it was quite bright and the vis was reasonable. I found a scollop among the smashed up shells and debris on the sea bed. I wanted to hang around to find more, but Mac was keen to get round the rest of the wreck.
We came into an enormous school of whiting which were very friendly. They didn't like having our torches shone on them, but when we turned them off, the fish swirled round us in huge numbers. I've never seen anything like it in British waters.
We swam up onto the stern and then started swimming into the wreck. Mac stopped to look at something, and I waited for him to proceed. I had my legs sticking out of the hole and felt someone grab one of them. I looked round and saw two other divers from our party swimming past. Afterwards Will said he had put a massive crab on my leg, hoping it would take hold. He joked that he had hoped I would take it to the surface for him.
There was plenty of bits of crockery lying in the muddy, rusty mess inside the wreck. I retrieved a small piece of angular white glazed china as a momento. We came out and shined our torches into various holes in the wreck including the winch house where there reportedly lives a conga. It wasn't visible when we looked. We did see a large pale fish hovering nearby though. Came round to the port side again and spotted a lobster disappearing in a cloud of silt being chased by Will.
Gary brought up what looked like a porthole, but turned out on closer examination to be a brass housing for a light. My scollop shell was empty. Mac said he particularly liked this dive because we got to see the whole thing and had a scramble around inside.