Cat travels from Spain to France over 5 months to reunite with family

A tuxedo cat named Filou, which means “trickster” in French, magically found its way back home to France after going missing in Spain five months before.

Mr Patrick Sire and his wife Evelyne, who live in the French town Olonzac, had been returning from a holiday around the Spanish Ebro Delta when their cat disappeared.

Travelling with them in their camper van, Filou would often leave at night and return later, Mr Sire told local media outlet France 3.

On Aug 9, they made a stop at a petrol station between Barcelona and Girona. Later that day, Mr Sire realised a window in the van had been left open.

The next morning, they called for Filou as they always did, but this time, the cat did not appear.

“We looked everywhere for him and couldn’t find him in the camper van after emptying it,” Mr Sire said. He realised the cat had probably slipped out the open window the day before.

But the experienced cat owner was not panicking yet. Twenty years ago, a previous cat of his had also gone missing during a holiday. When he returned to his camping spot three days later, he found his cat taking refuge with the owners of the motorhome that had parked at the same place.

So, on Aug 10, the Sires went back to the petrol station in Spain, a 250km journey that would have taken a few hours to drive but a couple of days to walk.

They filed a report with the Spanish Civil Guard, posted photos and searched the area, but even with the help of Bigotitos de Angel, a Spanish organisation looking after feral cats, their efforts were in vain.

Another search on Aug 19 turned up nothing. Filou’s vanishing act looked like it was going to last.

But, five months later, on Jan 9, the Sires received good news. Filou had been living with Ms Helene Tisseyre, from the neighbouring village of Homps, for the past month.

In early December, Ms Tisseyre spotted a “thin and weak” cat and began taking care of it. It looked like it was “just skin and bones”, she recounted to French newspaper Le Parisien.

In early January, she took the cat to a vet after it started coughing. There, she discovered Filou was not a stray cat after all – it had a family whose address was in Olonzac, a kilometre away from her.

“He was waiting for us behind the door,” Mr Sire said, recalling the emotional reunion between the couple and the cat they had been missing for almost half a year.

With their beloved cat safely back home, the couple are now endeavouring to retrace Filou’s long journey from Spain to France.

“We are looking for people who may have seen him, helped him or given him shelter,” Mrs Sire said.

But for now, how Filou made the 250km journey from Spain to its home in France will remain the trickster cat’s secret.