US student receives reply to message in bottle 9 years later from France

Rockport (US), Nov 12: A Massachusetts college student has received a response to a message he threw into the ocean when he was 10 years old.

Suffolk University sophomore Max Vredenburgh says he put the letter into a glass wine bottle that he threw into the water at Long Beach in Rockport in August 2010.

Vredenburgh's father texted him Friday to say that he had received a letter from someone named "G Dubois" who found the bottle on a beach in Southern France on October 10. In Vredenburgh's original letter he listed some of his favourite things including apples, the beach and outer space. He also asked that the letter's recipient "please write back." The 19-year-old Vredenburgh posted photos of the letters to his Twitter account on Friday.

In Vredenburgh's original letter he listed some of his favourite things including apples, the beach and outer space. He also asked that the letter's recipient "please write back".

The 19-year-old Vredenburgh has now posted photos of the letters on Twitter.

The mysterious Dubois is friendly, writing in somewhat stilted English, but hardly effusive. The brief missive began simply: "Hello." Then he or she stated that the letter had been found "on a beach in France between Contis and Mimizan", which is about an hour and a half drive north of Biarritz, not far from the Pyrenees and the Spanish border.

It notes that the bottle will have crossed 6,000km (just over 3,700 miles) and in the nine years taken its American sender must have "grown a lot". It includes a map with a circle around the French beach.

Vredenburgh also posted a picture of his original letter, which the finder appears to have sent back to him. In neat, childish printing, he had also added that his favourite colour was blue and that he liked animals and cars.

The adult Vredenburgh pointed out: "I am mind blown. 9 years."