Cat 'guides injured walker to safety' after he got lost in Swiss Alps

'She kept looking at me to follow and led me straight to the path that would take me back down to the valley'

A hiker claims he was guided back to the right path after he sprained his ankle and got a lost in the Alps.

The Hungarian man said he became disorientated and found his intended route blocked while walking in the mountains near Gimmelwald, Switzerland.

Fortunately, he encountered a friendly local cat who guided him back to safety.

The walker, posting with the username sc4s2cg, has described his experience on Reddit, and a 2013 video purporting to show the same encounter with the black and white cat was linked to on YouTube.

Gimmelwald is a small village in Bernese Oberland at the foot of the Junfrau-Aletsch Unesco World Heritage Site

The lone walker said he had sprained his ankle and was unsure how to get home after discovering the only route back had been closed.

“[The cat] was just wandering around, [then] found me while I was resting from a hike,” he said.

“Then she was walking and kept looking at me to follow [and] led me straight to the path that would take me back down to the valley.

The walker explained: “Gimmelwald is a tiny, tiny stunningly beautiful village [and] I actually got ‘lost’ in the surrounding mountains.

“It was the end of ski season when I got to [the village of] Lauterbrunnen, so the lifts weren't working and some of the trails were closed.”

The Reddit post has attracted significant interest from local walkers. A number of users were quick to observe they, too, have seen the cat.

It later became apparent the cat belonged to a couple who own a nearby hostel.