Snow Lake's Kelly Peterson tells an amazing story about how he and two of his friends made a pact to travel to Europe during the summer following their graduation. When the time had arrived and the trip came to realization, the trio boarded an ocean liner in Montreal and shipped out to Rotterdam during the summer of 1978.
During the voyage, the ship's captain would post a pin on a map in a common area of the vessel, showing passengers their estimated location on the ocean. When the map showed that they were approximately in the middle of the Atlantic, Peterson and his friends toasted the milestone with a bottle of wine their parents arranged for them to have at supper that evening.

After drinking the wine, they got to talking, and young men being the way they are, decided to put a message in the emptied wine bottle and toss it over the side of the ship. They wrote up their message and after placing Peterson’s address on it, threw it overboard and without another thought, got on with their coming of age trip to Europe.

Three months after arriving back in Canada, and much to Peterson's surprise, he received a letter in the mail from a man in Cornwall, England. The writer had found their bottle on Marazion Beach, and he thought he would advise him of the discovery.

Marazion is an ancient charter town situated on the shore of Mount's Bay in the far west of Cornwall. It is one of the most popular holiday destinations in the United Kingdom.

Peterson admits what he did next was a mistake, but he threw the letter in a drawer, planning to answer it at a later date. That date did not come… for quite some time.

Thirty-two years later, Peterson came across the letter and told his son Nick, 16, the tale of his trip one night over dinner. Nick was astounded that his father had not sent a letter in reply and insisted that they compose one at that very moment. They did. But it, too, sat for a few months, until one day, after much probing from Nick, Peterson finally posted it.

Peterson's thoughts at the time were that after so many years there was no way his letter would reach the person who found his wine bottle. However, on the off chance that it did, he added his e-mail address and this postscript: "Don’t wait 32 years to reply, cause I’ll be dead!" Along with a photocopy of the original letter, his long awaited reply was forwarded to the finder's original address in Cornwall, England.

Peterson got lucky. The man who had found his bottle had not lived at that address for close to 25 years, but had been a postman in the area the entire time, retiring some five years earlier. His mates at the post office knew where to find him, they did so, and they gave him Peterson's letter of reply.

A number of weeks passed, and one night Peterson's fiancé, Judy Gale, excitedly informed him that he had received an e-mail from their “bottle man.” Extremely happy to receive it, the couple read the e-mail and replied, sending several pictures along with it. The man, Dave Lovell is his name, did the same. Although Lovell, who is now in his mid-fifties, no longer possessed the wine bottle he found 32 years previous, he sent a number of pictures recreating his famous find. He also advised that he was now retired and that he rebuilds Austin Minis as a hobby in the community where he currently resides.

"Judy and I thought that it was pretty amazing that someone that young (early twenties) had found the bottle, making contacting them 32 years later a possibility," said Peterson. "It was something I didn't think was possible."