THERE was only one thing to do when Jarvis the Jack Russell

got lost during a walk miles from home – he hopped on to a

ferry to cross a river and followed his nose back to his own

doorstep.

When his owner lost him and left him trotting around happily

in a Cornish country estate, he carried on having some fun in

the woods before taking the next ferry home.

When the ferry tied up, he trotted down the slipway, just

like all the other passengers, jumped on and found himself

somewhere to sit.

At the other end he calmly walked off the ferry and set off

on the two-mile walk home.

His owner Vivienne Oxley said: “I just couldn't believe it.

I was so relieved.”

Jarvis vanished from Mrs Oxley's sight while out walking at

Mount Edgcumbe, in South East Cornwall, with her two-year-old

granddaughter Kaytie.

Soon after their arrival Jarvis “bolted off”. At first Mrs

Oxley thought nothing of it, since he had run off several times

before, but when he failed to return to her calls, she started

to panic.

She said: “I was really, really upset. He had gone off a

couple of times, but just around the corner, not out of sight.

Something must have spooked him.”

A distraught Mrs Oxley spent half an hour trying to track

Jarvis down and even enlisted the help of the wardens.

But it was getting late and Mrs Oxley decided she had to

head home with her granddaughter, taking the Cremyll ferry back

to Plymouth and walking the two miles back to Stoke.

Once Kaytie was safely home, she planned to return to the

estate to search for the six-year-old terrier.

But a few hours after his disappearance, Mrs Oxley received

a call from the warden to say there had been a sighting,

matching Jarvis' description, on the Cremyll ferry.

He said Jarvis seemed to know exactly where he was going,

calmly walking onto the ferry.

Mrs Oxley was about to make her way to the ferry when her

husband, Tony, called to say Jarvis had miraculously turned up

at home in Stoke.

Mrs Oxley, 56, said: “I didn't expect to see him again. I

thought he would get run over.

“When I got home he was just sat in the window as if nothing

had happened.”