A message in a bottle sent from Fiji over eight years ago forged an astonishing link between the Bay Area and Australia. A trio of friends from Sunnyvale, California, named Savannah, Kate, and Janice, dispatched their bottled note on an ocean trajectory in July 2016, a fact made public by a beach cleanup team from Townsville, Australia, who recently uncovered it. The hikers, initially mistaking the find for debris, were soon to pleasantly discover a piece of preserved correspondence, a memento from half a world away.
During the cleanup, one hiker pried open the bottle, revealing a note humbly requesting its finder write back to a now-outdated Sunnyvale address. As reported by ABC7 News, the discoverers intended to contact the original senders. Despite discovering the address was no longer accurate, the home having been sold in 2018, the hikers weren’t dissuaded. They sought the help of social media, creating a post from the Townsville Hike and Explore Facebook page, which implored their community to share the content widely to aid in reconnecting the note with its originators.
"We've found your message Savannah, Kate and Janice of Yorktown Drive, Sunnyvale, California," exclaimed their Facebook post. The NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit picked up the search and successfully located Savannah Green, Janice Pierce and Kate Bonhan, as per NBC Bay Area.
"It kind of felt almost spiritual, like the way that it survived eight years and was still legible and my hair tie was still on the note," Savannah Green, one of the original message senders, told NBC Bay Area. It wasn't only nostalgia that the message carried from Fiji to Australia. The friends had been on a meaningful journey back then, bringing donations to a hurricane-stricken Fijian village. The journey continues with the three women hoping to soon meet their new friends from down under, bridging an even greater distance between hearts and nations.
