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A Message In The Sand 

Author: Devan Mighton
Photographer: Trevor Booth
1 week ago
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A young treasure hunter brings joy to Makenzie Van Eyk and her family

River Vandenberg is a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ball of energy, and he is on a mission—he is searching for treasure. Scouring near the Belle River Pier, he is exploring the sand dunes exposed by October’s lake seiche. He often explores the beaches, picking up what is to his youthful imagination, lost treasures, under the watchful eye of his grandmother, Michelle. 

It is early autumn, and this St. John the Baptist Catholic Elementary School kindergarten student has just spotted something special. Sitting exposed is the cap on a plastic bottle. As they dig it out, fixed to it is a message held on with a dilapidated elastic telling them to read what is inside. 

“I found the message at the beach!” exclaimed River. “It was somewhere in the seaweed, and I was digging and I saw something plastic and I found the bottle.” A little disappointed, he reported that he thought it was a treasure map, but it was just a letter. 

But he did find treasure. 

Twenty-six years earlier, nine-year-old Makenzie Morris listened intently as her Gr. 4 teacher, Roland St. Pierre, read Paddle-to-the-Sea by Holling Clancy Holling to her and her St. John the Baptist classmates. The story of a young indigenous boy who carved a little canoe with a rider and names him Paddle-to-the-Sea, the story tells of Paddle’s journey as he is set afloat, passing through the mighty Great Lakes and makes his way to the Atlantic Ocean. 

Inspired by the story, St. Pierre had his 32 students write a short letter and make a message in a bottle, which they cast afloat at the beach in the spring of 1998. 

“There were 32 litterers in 1998—we all threw a plastic bottle,” jokes Makenzie (now Van Eyk) almost three decades later. “Can you imagine? The world would not be as accepting of this story in 2025.” 

As a child, visiting the lakes, she says that the mystery of her message-in-a-bottle would pique her curiosity. Did it pass through this lake? Was it here now? Only two of the 32 bottles were ever recovered before 2024, one in 1998 near Tecumseh and one in Lake Erie a year later. 

Makenzie has two children, Scarlet (9) and Huxley (6), who also now attend St. John the Baptist after she moved her family back into the area a year ago. After River recovered the bottle, he and his grandmother returned it to the school, to the amazement of the teachers, and with Scarlet in the same grade her mother was when the bottle was launched, the teachers chose to surprise her and her class. 

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“The teachers at the school made a great spectacle of the letter itself,” explained Makenzie. “[Scarlet’s teacher] wanted them all to have the anticipation of what it was going to be and the surprise, so she read the letter and held back saying my name until the very end. It was my maiden name obviously, but my daughter’s eyes lit up and she said, ‘That’s my mom!’” 

And, what of River? A young lad who loves playing hide-and-seek with his friends, his toy cars, and monster trucks. He is still holding out hope that he will find his treasure map in the sands near the Belle River Marina, but, in the meantime, it made him a happy little tyke to bring joy to another family. 

Makenzie is grateful to River and Michelle for digging up the letter and to the school presenting it to her daughter the way they did and says that it made her feel sentimental towards her hometown. 

“I think Belle River is one of the greatest places in the world!” exclaims Makenzie. “There’s been a big feeling of serendipity.” 

“I think it was a signpost for me that we made the right decision moving back here. It was like my letter was waiting for me to come home.” 

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