1st glass ticket: Brit lad’s message in a bottle bobs to Australia

Thrilled … Cade Scott

 

SCHOOLBOY Cade Scott threw a message in a bottle in the North Sea and got a reply 17 months later — from AUSTRALIA.

Cade, then eight, wrote the message on a Dr Who postcard in August 2011, before dad Terry sealed it in a wine bottle.

Postcard … Cade’s message

They then hurled it into the waves at Roker, Tyne and Wear, but heard no more until an envelope arrived this week, bearing a postmark from Perth, Western Australia.

Cade’s mum Andrea, 44, opened it and saw a reply from Aussie Matthew Ellam, who found the bottle on December 25. Matthew, 25, had returned Cade’s card and written on his own: “Hi Cade, thanks for your postcard. I found it whilst celebrating Christmas on the beach in Perth.”

Surprise … Aussie Matthew’s reply

Cade’s card’s journey is thought to be the longest by a message in a bottle.

The lad, now ten and from Sunderland, said: “I’m really pleased I got a reply. I didn’t know how far away Australia was.”