Allan Anderton thought he had seen the last of his new pair of glasses when they went down with his friend's sinking fishing boat at Taieri Mouth earlier this year.
So he was slightly bemused and a little sceptical this week when he was contacted by a woman in Rangiora who said she had found them.
Mr Anderton (57), of Waihola, was one of four men on a fishing trip when their boat took on water and sank more than 19km off the coast of Taieri Mouth on January 11 this year.
Apart from being cold and wet, the four men, who were all wearing life jackets, escaped unharmed.
At the time, Mr Anderton was just pleased not to be ''fish food'', but later realised his glasses were in a chilly bag with his lunch, which had gone down with the boat.
''I thought they were gone. We were 12 miles offshore.''
He wrote them off as lost at sea, got an insurance payout to replace them, and thought nothing more of it.
But last week he received a call from a woman living more than 400km away - in Rangiora, north of Christchurch - who said she had found his glasses while walking on a beach near her home.
They were still inside Mr Anderton's lunch container, and although his sandwiches were way past being fresh, his glasses were still intact - give or take a few bends in the frames.
The woman had tracked him down from the address label inside his glasses case, and posted them back to him, he said.
''When she called to say she had found them, it was unreal.
''I rang my mate and said: 'You'll never guess what's just happened'.
''It was amazing.''
The chilly bag must have popped out of the boat and up to the surface before floating off, he said.
Bridgman and Dean Optometrists office manager Karen Ross said staff had never heard of a story involving glasses which was so extraordinary.
''We were very surprised. We were just standing there saying: 'Really?'.''
Despite already having a new pair of glasses, Mr Anderton said he would not get rid of his seafaring pair.
''I'll probably just keep them until my new ones break, and then I'll wear them again,'' Mr Anderton said.
''To be honest, the [old] frames fit my head better than my new ones.''
