Surrey: Adventurous cat takes train into London from Weybridge

An adventurous cat had to be collected from London Waterloo station by her owner after taking a train into the capital from Surrey.

Michael Hardy, from Weybridge, says his two-year-old cat Tilly is known for straying, having caught buses before and even climbing behind the bar of his local pub.

Even so, he was taken aback when he received a call from a ticket office worker about Tilly’s 17.7-mile (28.5km) trip into the city.

Mr Hardy said: “What the hell is my cat doing in Waterloo getting on trains and going for a ride?”

Fortunately, Mr Hardy was working in London at the time and drove to the station to collect Tilly.

He said: “We didn’t know where she was. We looked on the Apple [air] tag and realised she’d gone to Waterloo.

“The only way she can get there is on the train. You look at the tag and you see it going from one stop to another.”

Trains from Weybridge take between 30 minutes and almost 90 minutes to get into Waterloo.

Tilly was adopted by Mr Hardy and his girlfriend after she was found as a stray.

He said: “We don’t know where she came from. These two girls knocked on my door with this cat.

“They just believed it was our cat. We took it in as they were only young girls.”

Mr Hardy explained how he had knocked on neighbours’ doors and got a local vet to check her microchip, but in the end the vet suggested they adopted Tilly.