Message in bottle travels North Sea to Australia With the help of his dad, Terry, the then eight-year-old sealed it in a wine bottle and launched his message into the sea at Roker, Tyne and Wear. It was only when he received a postcard from Matthew Ellam, 25, from Perth in Western Australia that Cade realised that his bottle had bobbed all the way across the world travelling nearly 10,000 miles. Matthew wrote back on 7 January 2012 saying: "Hi Cade, thanks for your postcard. I found it whilst celebrating Christmas on the beach in Perth, Western Australia! Happy New Year. It is thought that this could be the longest journey made by a message in a bottle. Cade said he was delighted his experiment had been successful. "I'm really pleased I got a reply," he said. I didn't know how far away Australia was. It is not the first postcard to make the long journey Down Under, however. Four-year-old Jasmine Hudson sent a bottle off the Bournemouth coast in April 2012 which was found by Barbara Richards, who lives near Largs Bay Beach in South Australia, just five months later.