The shells were in the tank along with two octopus who were shooting along like rockets.

The movement of the water flowing into the tank made this not easy to take.

All the seafood restaurants have their seafood alive in holding tanks. However I did notice that where the shells were kept, in the tank below, the water was not very clean. I remember at Stradbroke Island the chef there telling me that cockles were scavengers and he would leave the cockle for 10 hours  so they would purge their system, and clean up to eat, and these were shells straight from a glorious sea that I collected along the shore.

The shells in this restaurant was in grubby water, and that was another reason why I balked at eating them. When Grace cut the cockle flesh, the insides were full of murky something that put me off completely. I actually still feel ill thinking of it.

Anyway, the lobster had fun swimming back and forward in the tank that the public saw in the window.