London, Aug 22 : A Scottish man, who threw a message in the bottle into the sea when he was 11 years old, has reunited with it – 23 years later.

Donald Wylie, now aged 33, had thrown the bottle into the sea off Orkney in 1985 with a message asking its finder to pass it onto a boy of similar age.

The bottle was discovered by a team of volunteers cleaning up a beach at West Sands in St Andrews.

The group, which included students and staff from the University of St Andrews, were startled to find the message inside, and launched a search for the sender, which took them to Wylie still living in Orkney and working as a house builder.