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Drift Bottles

I’ve never found a message in a bottle. Granted, I’m not going to the beach daily, and most of the time when I’m on the beach, other people are on the beach, too. So there may have been bottles and someone else grabbed it before I could see it. But… I’ve never found one and this guy has found 1200.

I really love that he writes back. And that there is a whole world of drift bottles out there, and I only had the vaguest notion that this was a thing. Something people looked for and collected or sent out to see if their message will be returned.

A first blog post feels a little bit like sending a drift bottle into the vast internet sea. You write it, wondering if anyone will read it. And then one day a comment pops up on the page; human contact letting you know that you’ve been found. Heard.

Am I the only person out there who has never found a message in a bottle? Or do you have a good message-in-a-bottle story??

11 comments

1 Lori Lavender Luz { 12.12.17 at 10:43 am }

Whoa. This is a thing?

I’m probably out of the running, living thousands of miles from a coast. Maybe people leave messages in bottles on rivers?

2 Valery Valentina { 12.12.17 at 11:38 am }

Ha ha, well, that guy from the video goes to the beach I go to, no wonder I have never found one! And i doubt that I will be lucky when travelling to New Zealand, those beaches are so remote from anywhere else.

3 Cristy { 12.12.17 at 12:31 pm }

With Lori. I had zero idea people do this.

And I think you should do it! Send out a bottle Mel!!!

4 Sharon { 12.12.17 at 1:42 pm }

I have never found a bottle with a message, but I don’t live near the ocean and only get to visit a beach once a year, if I’m lucky. So you’re definitely not the only one. 🙂

I agree with your comparison to a first blog post, too.

5 Chris { 12.12.17 at 2:29 pm }

No, I’ve never found one either. Then again, I’ve never really looked. 🙂 My message in a bottle story is a take off on the concept. For many years my husband and I owned a mailbox store (Like a UPS store only it was an independent not a franchise). And, my mom and I were always trying to bring in new merchandise because we were adjacent to a retirement community where we had regulars who came in daily. One of the things we found were “messages in a bottle.” They were plastic bottles about 6 inches that you could write your own message but the bottles were decorated (inside and out) in various themes- things like happy birthday, new baby, happy anniversary and very cute. They were huge sellers. LOL

6 torthuil { 12.12.17 at 7:11 pm }

Cool! I’ve never found one; mind you living on an inland prairie that is rather unsurprising. I like that he writes back!

7 Stephanie (Travelcraft Journal) { 12.12.17 at 7:17 pm }

What. I thought it was extremely rare to find a message in a bottle. I’ve always thought it would be cool to find one, but living 6 hours from a beach doesn’t really help my odds.

8 Mali { 12.12.17 at 10:21 pm }

I remember as a child, when I grew up on a farm next to the Pacific Ocean, wondering if I would ever find one. But it seemed so impossible that one would drift up on our shores, and that I would find it. As Valery said, we’re very remote!

Do you think these bottles are part of the great Pacific/Atlantic rubbish/plastic conglomerations in the oceans? Makes them much less romantic.

9 loribeth { 12.13.17 at 7:37 pm }

I’ve never found a message in a bottle — BUT I did send one once, when I was about 6 or 7. I think I’d read about it or seen it in a movie. It was only in a lake in Saskatchewan, so it probably didn’t travel very far, lol. At any rate, I never heard anything back.

10 Jess { 12.13.17 at 9:44 pm }

That is so cool! I have never, ever found a message in a bottle. Just sea glass, that maybe once was a bottle with a message in it…it would be awesome to find one. I feel like sending a letter out is sort of like a time capsule, and it’s cool that this guy answers them. Love the analogy to your first blog post, too.

11 Charlotte { 12.13.17 at 11:39 pm }

I have never found a message. I have heard that people do this, collect them, but I always felt like it was similar to those people with metal detectors who comb the beaches at night. The people who live by the shore and have time to stroll along the beach. There is no other way anyone would be able to find that many.

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