Florida has seen more than its fair share of strangeness over the years, but 2012 saw something pretty odd wash up on one of the Sunshine State’s beaches.

Pompano Beach resident Gino Covacci was surprised to find an over-sized eyeball about the size of a softball while taking a stroll along the shore. Realizing the eye was still fresh and bleeding, Covacci wisely popped that bad boy in a plastic bag and stuck it in the fridge, buying himself time to dig up giant eyeball experts. When he found them, those experts agreed the eyeball most likely came from a swordfish and was probably cut out by a fisherman’s knife based on the markings. And here we were hoping we finally had evidence of Atlantis.

If there’s one thing you need to know about Cornwall, the southwestern tip of England, it’s that its beaches are magnets for Lego pieces.

In 1997, a container fell off a cargo ship on the coast of Cornwall. This container was loaded with millions of plastic Lego pieces, and they’ve been steadily making their way to Cornish beaches ever since. The captain of the ship in question told the BBC the ship was ravaged by a “once in a 100-year” wave on February 13, 1997, that picked the ship clean, in the process claiming 4.8 million Lego pieces meant for New York.

Collecting the predominantly nautical-themed Lego pieces has become more than just a hobby to Cornish beachcombers. Some pieces, such as the green dragon or the octopus, are ultra-rare, meaning kids and adults alike make it a competition to snag the best pieces. If you’re interested in joining in on the fun, check out the Facebook group and head to Cornwall yourself. If you’re in Florida, some of the Lego pieces might make their way to your beaches, according to one oceanographer, but no one really knows where exactly the floating Legos will go. They could have circled the globe by now, or they could be sailing the seven seas for centuries to come.

E.T.’s journey — riding flying bicycles, dressing up as a woman, and freaking everybody out by turning white and lying abandoned in a creek — is well known by cinephiles the world over. What many don’t know, however, is that the extra terrestrial once was kidnapped before being found waterlogged near a beach by Old Portsmouth, Hants.

Long story short, the daughter of a woman named Margaret Wells hand-crafted a replica of Steven Spielberg’s famous alien, which was stolen — along with various other things — in September 2011, according to The Telegraph. A few months later, one strolling civilian happened to see a body floating in the water and did what any upstanding citizen would do and called 999 (911 for Brits). Instead of a human body, first responders were surprised to find an alien wearing a massive grin and missing a finger.

Forget about merely phoning home. This E.T. took it upon himself to channel his inner dolphin and swim his way home, earning an A for effort and surely shedding a few pounds off that little beer belly.

In 1992, NPR reported that some 28,000 rubber duckies got the ride of their little lives, objectively way more fun than any bathtub could be. The bath toys sailed the high seas as a squad after the shipping container they were in took a swan dive off the side of a cargo ship. Naturally, the rubber duckies eventually found their way to shore — though not all at the same place.

Some of the duckies spent more than a decade surfing the ocean’s waves, eventually landing on the opposite side of the globe from their bathtime brethren. Some ducks ended up in Europe, while some ended up in Hawaii. Others made landfall all the way up in Alaska. Over a ten-year span, the family of ducks really got around, spreading out and blazing their own trails — which, in turn, has helped oceanographers better understand how floating ocean debris travels.

If you ever happen to find a rubber duck on the beach, go ahead and grab it. It may just have come from the famous spill. Just don’t put it in your mouth. It might have harmful chemicals in it, and besides, it’s probably pretty dirty after decades on the high seas.

One of 2008’s top stories — depending on how you rank your news — was that of a sea monster that washed up on a Long Island beach in the East Hamptons.

In July 2008, a woman happened across some sort of beached monstrosity. The creature in question appeared to be a strange conglomeration of animal parts and was quickly named the Montauk Monster. It lit the internet on fire — at least, for a little while. (Going viral with a creepy photo was a little easier back in the day.)

As fate would have it, the Montauk Monster wasn’t really a monster at all — it was just a decomposing raccoon with a rotting face, according to the experts. Hey, life is full of disappointments.