A WALKHAMPTON family were surprised and delighted last week when they received a reply to the message in a bottle they sent when sailing at Bigbury Bay.

The correspondence came back within a month from an elderly French lady living in Brittany .

Ten year-old William Semken had pleaded with his parents to let him send a message in a bottle while they were sailing at Bigbury in August.

They placed the message inside an old wine bottle and put it overboard — fewer than four weeks later the bottle was found by a French lady collecting oysters in the Bay of St Michel.

Mme Gallais, who found the bottle, spoke no English and so asked an English friend to translate and write back to the Semkens. Seventy-year-old Mme Gallais lives in St Meloir des Ondes, near Concale.

Sarah Semken said the family hoped they might be able to meet their new-found friend, the next time they visit France.