By Bob Pone

We've all heard one time or another about someone finding a message in a bottle. Or, throwing a bottle into the sea in hopes that someone will find it in some far away mysterious land. And if found, a sea story that conjures up romance, discovery and adventure. This is a sea story about a message in a bottle, where old ideas and new technologies come together. A story that produces great conversations with family, friends, and fellow sailors.

Several years back I helped in the delivery of “Elusive” a 49 foot ocean racing sailboat back to her home port. Elusive was in the Trans-Pacific Race. Each year in June, many boats of different sizes and classes race from California to Hawaii to challenge their sailing and navigational skills. It's a traditional sailboat race that has been in existence for over 100 years. It was during this delivery that I found the bottle.

It was August 22, 1987, our second week out from Hawaii. Normally we would have been home in two weeks, but that year the Pacific high pressure system moved north to 55 degrees. The way it's supposed to work is, you sail north from Hawaii to approximately 36 degrees, which is usually above the Pacific high pressure system, make a right turn and sail home, running with the wind and seas at your back. Consequently, with the high at 55 degrees we either had no wind or wind dead ahead. Needless to say it added a week to our trip home.

The day we found the bottle, the sea was calm with no clouds to block the sun. The flatness of the sea made it easier to find objects. Earlier we were able to find many Chinese glass fishing floats, which I was told are valuable to collectors. Jerry who was the skipper of Elusive and I were on watch. Jerry was at the helm and I was preparing to go below to write down our position, course and distance made good during our watch. I looked towards the bow hoping to see some more dolphins, because several hours earlier I was on the bow watching the Dolphins play in our bow wake. That's when I noticed the sun's reflections off the bottle about 50 yards out and a few degrees to port. Jokingly I yelled to Jerry “Hey look, there's a bottle with a note in it”. At that distance I really couldn't tell if there was a note, but I knew if I got Jerry's interest he would go over to investigate. We retrieved the bottle on the second pass with our fishing net. To my amazement, there was indeed a note in the bottle. “See I told you there was a note in the bottle”. At that moment all the crew was on deck to see what the commotion was about.

Before breaking the bottle open to redeem our prize, I asked Jerry if he would take a picture of me holding the bottle. I knew If I told this story, it would be hard to swallow without a picture to back it up. With great anticipation, Jerry snapped the picture and immediately the note was out in the open air. Carefully, I unrolled the note and took it below. All kinds of thoughts were streaming through my head. I couldn't wait to read it. The crew followed me below like barracuda after its next meal.

The message was written in 3 languages, English, Spanish and another language that I was not familiar with. The English and Spanish was difficult to read because the sun's ultraviolet had removed the ink from the note paper. The other language was readable, because it was positioned in the middle of the rolled up note. But what language was it? “Crap, now we have to wait till we get home.” Karen, Jerry's wife exclaimed “As-a-matter-of-fact, it's Norwegian.” Besides finding the bottle, which is like a million to one shot, Karen is of Norwegian decent and can speak and read Norwegian. What more could be right, at the right place and at the right time.

Karen deciphered the note, it read:

Argus        , 20th
Some words and tell me where you found this, Tell me a little about yourself. I should be delighted. I am a housewife, 28 years old, only passenger on board and I have thrown it into the sea on my way out of Japan, bound for Panama. I am Norwegian,  I have light blond hair with blue eyes.

My address is: Vigdis ................, Halsa, Norway

One week after arriving home, I sent a letter to Norway and received no reply.  I sent several more letters but always with the same results. “How long was this bottle floating around the Pacific?” For all I knew it could be over 50 years ago when the bottle was launched off the ship. I even found out later that our friends Jerry and Karen had visited Norway during a vacation. They tried to contact Vigdis, also with no success.

Its been 13 years since I found the bottle.  Many times while cleaning up my navigational and marine information, I would come upon the note. I am not sure, but I think I kept the original note in hopes that someday it would find its way home to its Norwegian author.

OK, ready for this! Remember when I said “What more could be right, at the right place and at the right time”, just keep this in mind.

Several years back I created a Marine Do-It-Yourselfer website. I receive e-mail questions about boat building and boat maintenance projects from all over the world. I recently received an e-mail from a fellow in Norway. In my reply to him, I asked him if he could locate Vigdis, the woman in the note. Two days later he sent me a reply:

"Olav" wrote:

> Hi Bob,
>
> Her name is VIGDIS ............, She still lives in Norway up north and
> her address is: .............
>
> She is now around 50. I talked to her on the phone, so it is the right
> woman.
> She would love to hear from you.
>
>Regard, Olav

I sent Vigdis the original note that she had written, a chart indicating where I had found her bottle, a picture of me with bottle in hand and a reply to her     24 year old message. It was a good feeling to be able to tell Vigdis my sea story. I hope she has fun telling our story to her family and friends, as I have.

While writing this article, I recieved  a reply from Vigdis and thought I would share it with you.

Dear Bob and family                                                                      Reipa 10/09/00

Thank you so much for your nice letter, with picture, map and my old message! It was really amazing. I am both happy and surprised! I can't believe that you have held on to this story all these years.

You can imagine how surprised I was when your friend Olav called me. And I wonder why I didn't receive the letter you sent me earlier, even though I had moved. Maybe there has been some kind of misunderstanding. Also that your friends, Jerry and Karen tried to contact me here in Norway without any luck - maybe I was on holiday or at work... Well, you sure have put out an effort to reach me!

Alot of things has happened in my life since I threw the bottle in the sea. At the time I wrote the message I was married. It was my husband at that time who translated my Norwegian into English and Spanish. Me and my husband got divorced in 1987, so that's why I moved. I am not so good in English, I understand quite a bit and also speak some, but to write it is worse. So I have asked my niece Wanja to help we write to you.

Well, back to the message in the bottle and its history. My exhusband was a sailor and sailed abroad. I was on a "visitor-trip" with my husband and was onboard for 3 months. It was a large boat that carried cars from Japan, over to the States and to Norway. We had been in Nagoya in Japan loading the boat with cars, and were heading down to Panama with destination Norway. After what I can interpret from my old message the boat must have been 4 days from Nagoya, on the way to Panama, when I dropped the bottle into the sea, and it had to be in the end of July 1976. The boat’s name was Argus. I had written M/S Argus on the top of the letter, but the M/S part is missing. I was not alone on the boat.  I must have written it wrong in some way. The boat held a crew of 20, and we were about 8 people on a visitor-trip.

It is funny to think that the bottle laid in the ocean for 11 years before it was found. And it's almost amazing that it didn't break on any of the reefs or reach land. I guess it was meant to be found. And the picture you sent me of you holding the bottle with all the scales on it is going to get a place of honor in my livingroom!

I live in Northern Norway, about 120 kilometers from Bode, which is the closest city. I am 52 years old and have three children: Marit (32), Roy-Victor (30), and Arnstein (23), and I also have 7 grandchildren!

I work as a cook on a ferry-boat that transports cars and people over the fjords and out to some small islands. I'm not married, but have a fiancée named Olav. I have worked on the ferry for 17 years, and my work schedule is that I am on board for a week at a time, and then I have one week off.

Well, now the mystery of the message in the bottle is solved! I am enclosing some pictures of me and my family, and hope to hear from you again soon.

Best Regards from

Vigdis

Somehow Its hard for me to think that the internet is such a new idea. The internet of today is not much different than that of the network of sailors who met in the Mediterranean Sea. Shipping their goods from all over the eastern world and sharing their stories. An  information waterway network of concepts, new thought and images. Ships brought theses navigators together, now its a pair of twisted phone wires.

Isn't the internet great!