Folly Cove (?)

I just wanted to find out what the hoopla is all about. I mean prior to getting wet and seeing for myself. Let's find out why everyone seems to love Folly.

ScubaNorth:

I just wanted to find out what the hoopla is all about. I mean prior to getting wet and seeing for myself. Let's find out why everyone seems to love Folly.

Click to expand...

I always heard it was the most photographed dive site in New England. I have no way to know if that's true, except there are a lot of pictures. One of my best UW pictures was from Folly Cove on a rare day with 35+ ' of vis.

Folly offers a few things that make it a nice shore dive site:

High tide easy entry/short walk from your car, dramatic wall topography on the left side if you were looking out to sea, the cove itself is protected from the elements so it is often calm when other sites are blown out, there are tons of anenomes to look at, and lot's of cracks for lobsters and other sea life.

It is pretty cool to be able to look straight up from the bottom of a wall, especially on days with decent vis. I have had some Zen moments there....once a small school of Cunner were very curious. One fish came up and began eating whatever was on the face of my mask. Imagine a fish literally nipping at your mask 2 inches in front of your eyes, seemingly unphased by your bubbles?

You can get a decent depth (50-70') but you need to swim a LONG way to reach this depth. I prefer to swim out a good ways then descend into at least 20' of water to begin the dive.

I'm sure others can chime in with their experiences. It's a good Massachusetts shore dive site.

--Matt

ScubaNorth:

I just wanted to find out what the hoopla is all about. I mean prior to getting wet and seeing for myself. Let's find out why everyone seems to love Folly.

Click to expand...

Matt pretty much said it all in his reply. The wall alone makes it rather unique at Cape Ann and it has the benefit of being both very pretty and very productive in lobsters (usually). The other nice thing is that pointing due north its also rather protected from the winds when the other sides of the cape are blown out. In fact that was the case yesterday when myself and two buddies headed out to C.A. to take advantage of the sun and nice warm temps. The rollers were coming on strong at Old Garden, Pebble, Back and Front beaches...in fact on just about every site. So we headed up to Folly were the waves were reasonable (1-2 ft). The short stats on the dive:
Water Temp: 37 degrees
Dive Time: 50 Minutes
Vis: 4-5 ft (ok...not so great)
This dive was on the right side as none of us had the motivation to due the surface swim to the wall. But it was high tide and we did swim out maybe 75-100 yds before we dropped under the surface. It was a bit surgey, but thats nothing new at Cape Ann. I would have liked better vis, but heck, the last time I was out in February at Niles it was only 1-2 feet, so this was at least double that!
All in all a good day. However, while the waves were pretty minimal they managed to pick up a bit as we were exiting. A good sized set of rollers came in while I was slowly walking out of the water and one knocked me right down. Try as I might I couldn't get back to my feet as they kept pummeling me so I swallowed my pride and crawled out on my hands and knees! Oh well...better humbled than broken!

Folly Cove also has at least two torpedo rays living in the sandy bottom between the left and right sides. Dove there last year with Hurleyskis and had a great encounter with one swimming a couple feet off the bottom. Aside from a shark, a seal or the legendary Lobzilla, it's probably the biggest animal a diver can encounter on a shore dive in this area. That alone makes it a great dive site.

Get there early and, even on a weekend, parking shouldn't be a problem.

LobstaMan

I have dove Old Garden often and on my last dive at that site last year Chebby and I came eye to eye with a Torpedo. I have to admit seeing one of these guys is probably as good as sharks in the Bahamas. The sharks at Shark Junction Grand Bahama are like big wild puppies so in a lot of ways the rays are cooler. Oh and no I don't mean you can pet them they are just like a begging dog and the divers actually make them a bit nervous. Out of a group of ten divers the three with the least brains the ceo of my company, a police officer from Atlanta and myself swam toward the sharks and they actually looked like they were looking over their shoulder to be sure we kept our distance. Like the saying goes I didn't have to out swim the shark just one of the other divers, so I kept the ceo in front of me. Hope this guy (Torpedeo Ray) is territorial and is hanging around again this year.

There was a short write-up in the (i think) november issue of scuba diving magazine on MASS diving (MASS Appeal) and Folly was featured. Though they also featured Corporation Beach in Dennis, The Breakwater, and the Pinthus. Can't say I'd really recommend Corporation Beach as a dive, just too damn shallow!! So I'm not sure what that's saying about the write-up. Though corporation beach makes a very pretty snorkel/freedive where you'd seen pleanty of underwater activity (crabs, spider crabs, tautog, stripers, and a few small lobsters).

~stu

I 've got well over 200 dives at Folly and indeed it is a wonderful site. You have the nice wall on the western side, the sandy area in the center and the rock and boulder strewn area on the eastern side.

The spectrum of life at the site is better than most any shore diving site in the Cape Ann area. You have metridium anemones, northern red anemones (if you know where to look) and a few other species of anemones. Other invertebrate life is also abundant. Sometimes I'm surprised by unlikely visitors like chain siphonophores and other gelatinous creatures. I don't hunt lobster but there are areas where they just get in your way because there are so many. I've found a half-dozen species of nudibranchs on a single dive there.

As for fish there are sculpin, sea ravens, cunner, pout, striped bass, pipefish, torpedo rays, flounder an others to be found in their proper season. In the fall the possibility of a stray tropical fish can happen. I've seen queen triggers, filefish and a few others. I've spotted seals on the surface a couple of times, none underwater yet.

One day I arrived to find hundreds of gulls in a feeding frenzy on the water. When I got in the entire cove was a madhouse of herring or herring-like fish swimming in a panic to avoid the gulls and other predators. Had the cove to myself that day!

It's just a very cool place with relatively good parking and entry and exit from the water.

Don't spread the word too much though. Crowds can spoil nice places.

A better shore dive in New England would be hard to find. Now I know of a few better but I'm not telling exactly where!

DSDO

Alan

Y i love it ..
it was my first dive with my OW card .. last year ...
so i guess its like my home town .......



yes i love it

I do not love Folly. Yes, it is easy and well-protected, but I do not find it very interesting, and parking down the road is an annoyance. I did 14 dives there including my AOW certification, but had not been there since 2003. In part, Folly's very popularity is what turns me off -- I prefer less crowd. If I could get to Folly Cove with a boat or a DPV, I would do it -- to explore less accessible parts.

Oh, I had seen the torpedo ray at Folly. Impressive, but not enough of a reason to go there again.

personaly the torpedo ray makes me a bit nervous


id be scared i would step on it or something, i noticed you mentioned its been spotted on both the right and left sides..

how often are they pravoked? i am curious about them more than anything but also a bit nervous..

i havent dove there yet, but hope to soon... the snorkeling off sure isnt to bad