Mystery of Garfield phones washing up on beaches in France solved after 30 years
- Beach cleaners have been bemused by the regular appearance of the bright orange telephones but a local has finally revealed where they come from
For more than 30 years, bright orange “Garfield” phones have been washing up on the French coast to the bemusement of local beach cleaners, who have finally cracked the mystery behind them.
Locals had long suspected a lost shipping container was to blame for the novelty landline phones, modelled on the prickly feline cartoon character, that have plagued the northern Finistere beaches for decades.
“Our association has existed for 18 years and in that time we have found pieces of Garfield telephones almost each time we clean,” said Claire Simonin, the head of local beach cleaning group Ar Viltansou in Brittany.
But it wasn’t until a local revealed that he had discovered the container after a storm in the 1980s that they were finally able to find it – wedged in a partially submerged cave only accessible at low tide.
“He told us where it was … it was very, very dangerous,” Simonin said after an expedition to track it down.
“We found this incredible fissure that is 30-metres deep and at the very bottom, there were the remains of a container,” she said. “Under the boulders in front of the entrance, we found 23 complete handsets with electronics and wires. They were everywhere.”