Message in a Bottle Lands 3,000 Miles Across Atlantic in France

ROCKPORT, Mass. – A bottle with a message written by a woman who tossed it into the sea in 2003 off Cape Ann in Massachusetts was found 3,000 miles across the Atlantic off the coast of France.

Michel and Daniele Onesime say they were going fishing last month from the port at St. Gilles Croix de Vie when they found the bottle in the water.

The message was from Ann Hernandez, a lighthouse keeper on Thacher Island off the coast of Rockport, where she had thrown bottles with notes into the water every October on her birthday since 1991.

In the note, Hernandez identified herself and urged any finders to send a card to her year-round home in Park Forest, Ill.

The Onesimes tried to do that, but learned Hernandez died unexpectedly last year at the age of 61 from complications from surgery.