What's great about New England Diving?

[Nudgeroni]

Tropical diving is a relatively easy sell: exotic locations, lots of colorful fish, great viz, etc. Cold water diving in NE has a lot of fans, and I'd like to hear from some of them about what makes it worth climbing into a dry suit.

I should also note here that wreck diving is appealing to me, but I need additional lines of persuasion to get my easily chilled spouse excited about the prospect.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Rainer]

It's close?

 

[Nudgeroni]

Okey dokey. Points for honesty, there.

 

[Jimmer]

It's wet.

 

[Jimmer]

Hard to dive without water

 

[Bretagus]

There are some sites off Cape Ann that have some giant, 20-30ft boulders underwater... I've always thought those were pretty cool. Far fewer (if any) "vacation divers"... most of the people I've met on the weekends were diehards.

I don't know, I just love diving... so yeah, its close and wet!

 

[Diving Doc]

Any diving with the word 'England' in it has got to be fantastic!!

 

[MSilvia]

Aside from the MANY shipwrecks (real wrecks, not stripped "artificial reefs") and the convenience of diving without having to travel, there is a lot of color and marine life, some of which is also delicious. You can see tropical fish, anemonae, urchins, nudibranchs, cephelopods, enormous colorful sea stars, etc. as well as lobster, scallops, cod, stripers, sea ravens, flounder, and all of the other local things you might expect in New England... like seals.

The local visibility often gets better as the water gets colder too... I've seen 50+ feet on several occasions over the past few months.

Furthermore, if exotic means "different from what you and the folks at home are accustomed to", then any underwater location you've never been to is that.

Really, I don't see why diving locally isn't MUCH more popular than it is, except that people imagine it to be a lot less rewarding than I find it to be. It is definately more gear intensive than tropical diving, but I think it's well worth it for many reasons.

 

[fppf]

Our shop does a weekend trip to Cape Ann every year.
They do a bunch of shore dives and dive the Chester Polling.

My most memerable moment was swimming by a lobster trap that had a good size lobster in it with his claws hanging out of the trap. First thing that popped in my head was a scene in "Finding Nemo", "Hey bud". I almost drown that day laughing so hard.

Living up north less then 2 miles from lake erie, a dry suit is not that big of deal. We have more dives in a dry suit that in a wet suit.

 

[ckjacques53198]

Putting on a full 7mm wetsuit with hood and all that weight is not fun but as soon as I get in the water it all seems worth it.