The last resting place of the steel Lemmings.

There is a stretch of coast on the Wirral peninsula UK that runs from New Brighton to the Seacombe ferry terminal, which shuttles locals and tourists alike across the waters to Liverpool (I think it likely that Gerry & the Pacemakers ubiquitous 'ferry cross the Mersey' provides the journey soundtrack in many a passengers head on this trip.)

If you walk from the ferry along Seacombe promenade there is a tract of beach where what can only be described as an urban elephants graveyard for shopping carts can be found.

A legend exists in Africa of a place known as the 'elephant graveyard'. It is speculated that sensing their time is up, elder elephants would travel to join the last resting place of the many thousands of their ancestors that litter the gounds.

The scene along Seacombe parade reminded me of this story...dozens of shopping carts and other random 2 & 4 wheeled modes of transport (I counted 3 wheelchairs) lay half buried in the sands, their twisted steel and aluminium frames reminiscent of fallen bodies shed of their flesh.

Theories surrounding the elephant legend suggest that during lean times starving elephants gather in places where finding food is easier and subsequently die there, which probably accounts for why elephant skeletons are found in large groups near permanent sources of water. The similarities to Merseysides own coastal graveyard had me imagining fleets of shopping carts redundant in the recent economic crisis, slowly making their way through the dead of night along quiet back streets, drawn to the large expanse of water to the east and like Lemmings, hurling themselves to the beach from the promenade wall....