A CHESTER businessman taking on stages of the Tour de France for charity has had an emotional meeting with the French schoolgirl who discovered a message in a bottle he threw into the English Channel 34 years ago.
Adrian Lomas, 43, was a nine-year-old schoolboy when he threw the bottle into the sea on the way back from a trip to the Channel Islands.
Amazingly, the young Adrian received a reply three months later from a nine-year-old schoolgirl, Emmanuelle Demeautis, who found his message in a bottle washed up on the beaches of French coastal town Cherbourg.
The two began writing and remained in contact ever since but never managed to meet up.
That all changed when Adrian, who was cycling the Tour de Force, the Tour de France event which precedes the professional event.
Adrian, who has been raising funds for The William Wates Memorial Trust, met Emmanuelle and her daughter after she had seen his progress during his challenge on Facebook.
Adrian, managing director of Cheshire- based digital agency Blueleaf, said: “It was such a amazing thing to finally meet up with Emmanuelle face-to-face after all these years.
“Emmanuelle left home at 7am on Wednesday and made the two-hour trip to meet me for the first time on the Causeway of the Mont Saint-Michel – 34 years after we started writing to each other.
“It was a really emotional meeting; we both know each other so well, both have families and are interested in similar things. Her father was a champion cyclist and her cousin is working with a cycling team. Emmanuelle and her husband write and illustrate books.
“We wrote for many years and, at one stage, we planned to meet in Tahiti when I was travelling and she was working as a nurse but it didn’t happen.
“However, thanks to Facebook, Emmanuelle spotted I was riding the Tour de Force and got in touch.”
Adrian, one of only 40 cyclists taking on the full Tour de Force challenge, told how both his and Emmanuelle’s families are planning to meet up.
He said: “I can’t believe after throwing the bottle off the ferry on the way back from my holiday when I was nine, that Emmanuelle found it on the beach when she was walking her dog.”
