Woman’s ‘message in a bottle’ sent back to her with an angry letter

A woman who regularly threw plastic bottles with letters inside into the sea received a reply – telling her to stop littering.

Lorraine Forbes, 58, has long been sending her ‘message in a bottle’s off the coast of East Sussex in the hope of making a romantic connection.

A few of her attempts have reached as far as Holland and France, but most, she admits, have washed up on the shores of nearby beaches.

Although some people have replied to say they found the bottles, none have led to romances, and a recent response may have put an end to her unconventional search for love.

Lorraine said she received a box full of rocks in the post that also contained one her bottles with a message she’d written on the back of a John Lydon gig flyer, along with an angry note from a litter picker.

The note read: ‘Please stop throwing rubbish in the sea. It goes to Pevensey Bay or Normans Bay, one day later. Many thanks, a rubbish picker.’

The parcel cost her £7 to receive, which she said made the response particularly ‘nasty’.

Lorraine, who lives in Eastbourne, said her intentions were only to spark a connection.

‘I have been sending the letters for years. Whoever writes back to me rarely want to meet me, they just tell me where they found them,’ she explained.

‘I just wanted a bit of romance. It has always been a hobby of mine. It is an old-fashioned thing.

‘It was a cowardly litter picker who sent me the response. I had to pay £7 to receive it. I think that it is really nasty. They were trying to make a point and teach me a lesson.’

She said the person didn’t reveal their name so she’ll never know who sent the box.

‘If they had I would demand that they give me my £7 back,’ she added.

Lorraine usually throws the bottles off Eastbourne pier in bulk, using plastic bottles rather than glass ones so they don’t shatter on their travels.

She admitted, however, that she has been told off in the past for the impact her littering could have on wildlife.

She said that although the litter picker’s method had been cruel, it had been a wakeup call that environmental health officials might find the bottles with her address on them and take action.

‘Eastbourne Harbour have told me off before for throwing the bottles into the water, they keep trying to stop me,’ Lorraine said.

‘I probably won’t keep doing it. This has made me realise that environmental health could find my letters with my name and address and I might get in legal trouble.’

In September a British boy who threw a ‘message in a bottle’ into the sea at South Shields, Tyne and Wear received a reply to say it had floated 4,200 miles to St Lucia in the Caribbean.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.