'My mum never got to travel the world, hopefully her next journey lasts longer than 12 hours'
"I am hoping she goes further this time and finally gets a chance to travel the world"
A woman who bottled her mum's ashes and threw them out to sea hopes her mum will now 'finally get chance to see the world' thanks to the kindness of strangers on social media.
Cara Melia and her four siblings tragically lost their mum Wendy aged just 51 unexpectedly to heart disease in February of this year.
During a recent visit to a beach in Skegness, Cara, from Oldham, decided that instead of scattering her mum's ashes, she would bottle them with a handwritten note and send them out to sea in the hopes her mum would travel the world.
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Having always wanted to have travelled, Wendy never got the chance due to being full-time carer for her late brother and mum, and was a stay-at-home mum to her five children in the Sholver area.
Speaking to the M.E.N, Cara said: "We lost my mum very unexpectedly. Nobody was prepared for at all.
"We had the funeral and she was cremated. I had booked a holiday to go to Butlins with my friend in Skegness, so I thought I'd scatter her on the beach where she was at her happiest.
"But my best friend thought of the bottle idea and put her out to sea. I wrote the note because I wanted her to finally get to travel because she didn't get to before she passed.
"For a long time she looked after her late brother and her mum as their carer. She had five children who she ended up loving and adoring.
"She was very quirky and different. She always loved her leather jacket and her boots. If she could be anywhere it would always be the beach. It didn't matter where it was.
But just 12 hours after releasing the bottle into the sea at Ingoldmells Beach, another woman also on holiday at Butlins with her two children saw the bottle had washed up onto shore, and read the handwritten message from Cara, asking for any finders to throw it back into the water.
"This is my mum. Throw her back in she's travelling the world," the note read.
After finding the bottle and reading the note, the mum then posted a heart-warming status on Facebook, along with a video of her son throwing the bottle back into the sea, relying on the power of social media to track Cara down and inform her that Wendy was getting another chance at travelling.
"Can everyone please share this far and wide in hope it finds Cara from Oldham!!," it read. "We found this lovely lady earlier today at Butlins, Skegness beach. She's been thrown back in the sea as requested.. happy travels Cara's Mum."
Within minutes, the post had been re-shared in a number of groups and quickly made its way back to Cara, who now lives in Royton.
"I'd thrown the bottle in hoping she'd have a good travel but within 12 hours she was back on the beach and it didn't go as planned," Cara added.
"Then my best friend rang me and said 'your mum's on Facebook' and told me someone had found her already. I have said a big thank you to her for putting her back in the sea because so many people wouldn't have bothered.
"I am hoping she goes further this time and finally gets a chance to travel the world. It seems to have touched so many people."
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