bottle with their own note. we went one mile offshore off ocean city, maryland, and we threw it in, and it just started sailing. reporter: the now 14-year-old didn t give it much thought until this month more than three years later and half a world away, rita simmonds and ciaran marron were walking on this irish beach when they noticed something in the sand. you could see a tag was tied up to something in the bottle, and so we sort of knew right away there was a message in the bottle it s a once-in-a-lifetime thing. it s something you sort of dream of as a kid. reporter: so they reached out to the boy who wrote the note, finding sasha s father through facebook. i m excited i m surprised it actually made it somewhere. reporter: they connected online and have now forged a friendship it brought us together. we found out a little bit more