THE hunt is on for three Basingstoke residents after a message in a bottle was discovered 18 years after it was written.

Amy Alboni, Jill Ellis and three-year-old George were out exploring and looking for fish by the River Loddon when they made the unusual find yesterday (March 18).

Amy, 39, who works as a nanny looking after George, spotted the bottle stuck in the river and after closer inspection realised it contained a message.

With help from George’s grandma Jill, 71, they managed to retrieve the message and were shocked to discover it was dated May 28, 2003.

It reads: “Hello just thought I’d let you know your sad if u read this, we woz eya 28th May 2003 at 3:30 in Eastrop Park. Jack, Dean, Sally, woz eya.”

Basingstoke Gazette:

Amy and Jill are keen on finding the trio, who they believe will now be in their 30’s, to let them know about the discovery.

Amy told the Gazette: “It just looked quite cool how it had been in there for 18 years and nobody had found it. It obviously hasn’t travelled very far at all really.

“I thought [the people who sent the message] are probably going to be around 30 now, from the writing I think they must have been teenagers.

“I thought if they saw it they might think it was really cool that what they did in a park 18 years ago has turned up now.”

Alongside wanting to find the trio, Amy also highlighted how shocked she was at the condition of the plastic bottle.

Basingstoke Gazette:

“It kind of shows just how bad plastic is because it could have been in there a week really, the plastic was in perfect condition. It was a bit bent and a dirty but it hadn’t degraded at all.”

“It was quite an exciting find with life being so boring a in lockdown.”

Do you know a Jack, Dean or a Sally who would have been in Basingstoke in 2003?

Email newsdesk@basingstokegazette.co.uk if you think you could help.