Newcomb Hollow Beach

A quieter alternative to Cahoon Hollow and White Crest with equally good surf. Smaller lot means fewer people. Walking north, you can find stretches of beach entirely to yourself.

Newcomb Hollow is the northernmost of Wellfleet's three ocean beaches and the quietest by reputation — though anyone who came in 2018 will remember it as the site of the first shark fatality on the Massachusetts coast in 80 years, a tragedy that changed how the entire Outer Cape thinks about its waters. The beach itself remains one of the most beautiful on the Cape: a long curve of pale sand at the base of an eroding dune cliff, with quieter surf than the more crowded Cahoon and White Crest a mile south. The lot is small and Wellfleet-sticker, with a steep wooden staircase descending to the beach. Walking north toward Truro you can find half a mile of nearly empty sand on a summer afternoon, with the dune face changing color from cinnamon to gold as the sun moves. The lifeguard zone is now flanked by shark-spotting towers, and rescue gear stations and 'Stop the Bleed' kits are posted at the staircase — a sobering but necessary feature of Outer Cape ocean beaches today.