How a letter in a bottle’s 14,500km journey made two lives collide
A touching letter in a bottle cast into the ocean off Chile in 2007 has united a Norwegian sailor and a Darwin businessman in an unlikely friendship spanning two decades and thousands of miles
READING LEVEL: GREEN
A message in a bottle dropped into the ocean off the coast of South America almost two decades ago has united a Norwegian and an Australian across thousands of miles in an incredible tale of fate and friendship.
It was 2012 when Darwin man John Tannos took a fishing trip with friends off the northern tip of Queensland, spending a week aboard a boat in the Torres Strait.
Each afternoon, they anchored behind Aureed Island to rest and stretch their legs on the small patch of sand and palm trees about 1.6km at its widest.
“We were walking around the western side and I could see this bottle with paper in it, so I said, ‘Hey, there’s a message in a bottle’, and sure enough …” Mr Tannos said.
The bottle would have been easy to miss among the debris* washed ashore.
“There were thongs all around this island, plastic fishing buoys, nets and bottles, and all it would have taken was one more big tide to probably cover it or wash it back out again,” Mr Tannos said.
Mr Tannos had discovered a letter dated December 2007, which had travelled more than 14,500km across the Pacific Ocean to reach him.
“I am sending this letter to you from a position off the coast of Chile. My name is Petter, and I am a navigation* officer on a cargo ship,” it read.
Petter Vatn wrote that he was from Trondheim, in Norway, and was looking forward to getting home in time for Christmas.
“We have had bad weather most of the time … waves up to 10 metres and temperatures around 10 Celsius,” the letter said.
“When I am on board the ship, I miss the green grass and the trees.
“I wonder where this letter will end up. A small bottle in the big ocean. Winds, waves, currents. It must travel far to reach shore from here.
“I hope one day it will end up on a friendly shore, and that it is found by a friendly soul. Whoever you are, wherever you live, I hope your life is good.
“I would very much like to get to know you, and to learn about your place of living. No matter if you are young or old, man or woman. If you can, please send me a letter or a postcard.”
As soon as Mr Tannos returned home, he wrote to the letter’s author, but his letter was returned to sender.
Mr Tannos then found someone on Facebook with the right name, but that message was missed for three more years.
Finally, in 2015, Mr Vatn saw the message and replied – it was indeed he who had sent the message in a bottle.
“That was a big surprise,” Mr Vatn said.
“I can remember sending (the bottle overboard) when I was working on this tanker, but that was years before John found it, so by that time I’d almost forgotten about the whole thing.
“I was really glad somebody found it and also that we were able to meet up.”
The pair exchanged messages online, and finally met in person on New Year’s Day 2018 when Mr Tannos took a cruise through Norway.
It was arranged that he would meet Mr Vatn’s sister, who picked up Mr Tannos from the cruise ship and drove them south to meet Mr Vatn.
Mr Tannos told the ship’s crew he would meet up with them at the next port.
“They weren’t overly happy about that,” he said.
“I said, ‘Well, can you stop me? No? All right, bye.’
“Then I drove with Petter all the way down to where we were going to meet the boat again. So we travelled, talked, shared our stories.”
Eventually they reached the next port town, realising Mr Tannos had just minutes to spare.
“We drove frantically to the port, there was a hole in a big fence and Petter said ‘run through the hole, run straight, you turn right, you’ll see your boat!’
“It was dark at night and I’m thinking, oh my God, he’s gone, there’s probably no boat and I’m stranded.
“Anyway, I turned the corner, there’s the boat, I run up the gangway, let myself in a door and there stood the crew member – she’s on the phone to the Captain and told me I had 30 seconds left.
“’Plenty of time’, I said.”
Mr Vatn had stayed to make sure his friend got on the boat and soon got the call from the Aussie.
“I rang him to say I had the best day of my life, and if any of your family ever come to Australia, I’ll return the hospitality*,” Mr Tannos said.
That day eventually arrived. The pair – now aged 59 and 62 – reunited in Darwin last month, visiting restaurants, national parks and tourist sights.
The Norwegian was on a six week trip around Australia, and made a special detour to the Top End to visit his friend.
“I have been here a few times before on ships but never had the time to look around. I knew John was living here, so this time I’m on holiday – it’s good,” Mr Vatn said.
The pair have also stayed connected via social media over the years.
Recently Mr Tannos’s grandson was raising money for a readathon, and Mr Vatn’s family donated.
“I’m thinking, this is a connection formed from a message in a bottle – how people connect around the world,” Mr Tannos said.
POLL
GLOSSARY
- debris: fragments or remnants of something destroyed or broken; rubble
- navigation: the skill or process of plotting a route and directing a ship, aircraft, etc, along it
- hospitality: the act of being friendly and welcoming to guests and visitors
EXTRA READING
Message in a bottle washes ashore
Message in bottle returned after 55 years
Oldest message in a bottle found in WA
QUICK QUIZ
- Approximately how far did the fateful letter travel from South America?
- What was Mr Vatn’s job on the cargo ship when he penned the letter?
- What’s the name of the Torres Strait island where Mr Tannos found the bottle?
- Where in Norway is Mr Vatn from?
- Where was their most recent face-to-face reunion?
LISTEN TO THIS STORY
CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1. Your own message in a bottle
Create your own message that you could possibly put in a bottle to send in the ocean for someone to find near or far into the future.
What details would you include? What message are you going to give to the reader? Tell them about the world as it is now.
Decorate your letter as you would like it to look if you were to place in a bottle for real.
Time: allow 15 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social, Critical and Creative Thinking
2. Extension
Is it environmentally friendly for everyone to write a letter and throw a bottle into the ocean? What could be a more environmentally friendly way to send a message across the world for someone to find in the future?
Time: allow 10 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum Links: English, Design and Technologies, Civics and Citizenship, Personal and Social, Critical and Creative Thinking
VCOP ACTIVITY
Imaginative dialogue
Imagine you were there during the beginning or end of this letter’s journey from the cargo ship off the coast of Chile to the refuge island in the Torres Strait.
Create a conversation between two characters from the article – you may need or want to include yourself as one of the characters. Don’t forget to try to use facts and details from the article to help make your dialogue as realistic as possible.
Go through your writing and highlight any punctuation you have used in green. Make sure you carefully check the punctuation used for the dialogue and ensure you have opened and closed the speaking in the correct places.