A BOTTLE used to teach children how far litter can travel by sea has washed up on a Scottish island after an 8,700-mile journey.

The bottle was launched into the sea by scientist Aevar Thor Benediktsson at the oldest lighthouse in Iceland on January 10 last year.

From there, it was tracked by GPS and travelled more than 8,700 miles to eventually land on Tiree in the Inner Hebrides.

Rhoda Meek, 34, from Caolas on the island, was messaged by a friend who worked for a TV station to let her know it had washed ashore near her home. She spent half an hour looking for the “bottle” which was encased in a protective yellow shell and had barnacles latched on to it by the time it arrived.

The bottle was expected to land somewhere in Norway but took the long route to Scottish shores as it went west, nearly hitting Greenland and the north-east of Canada.

It was part of a project by Icelandic television station RUV to teach children that litter dropped in the sea does not disappear but becomes a problem for people living on the coast elsewhere in the world.

Ms Meek, a customer service assistant for a technology company, will now wrap the bottle up in foil and return it to Iceland.

She said: “I am quite jealous of the adventure it’s been on.”

The project was a collaboration between children’s TV host Aevar and the engineering firm Verkis.