A 10-year-old Waterford boy has found a message in a bottle – which was put into St Lawrence’s river in Quebec all of eight years ago.

Oisín Millea found the plastic Sprite bottle on the strand in his home village of Passage East, having been blown up on to the sand following high tides and strong winds.

Inside was a note written in French from two girls, Charlene and Claudia (no surnames) with an email address which is no longer in use. The girls write that they were from Montreal but were on holiday in Gaspesie in the Grande Vallee part of Quebec when they decided to put the message in the bottle. The bottle made a 4,000km journey. It made its way out of the estuary, past Newfoundland, across the Atlantic, up the Suir estuary before being washed up in Passage East.

The note inside was dry when Oisín found it: “I couldn’t believe it,” he says, “it’s amazing really. We haven’t been able to find out who the girls are as we don’t have their second names but maybe somebody out there will know. It’d be great to tell them we found their message eight years after.”

Principal of Passage East national school Greg Scanlon said they have contacts with schools in Newfoundland and will try to find a way of contacting the girls, who would now be 20.