KIRA the puppy got the walkies of her life when she journeyed 125 miles home from Hambleton with a broken leg.

The 11-month-old german shepherd disappeared from her Over Wyre home at Wardley's Riverside Inn for four months, before turning up 20 miles away from her previous home in Hexham, Northumberland.

Owner Jen Taylor, who has since moved back to Newcastle with her peripatetic pooch, said: "I let her out one morning and she just didn't come back.

"We don't know why she went - she hadn't been here very long.

"Maybe she just didn't like Blackpool," said Jen, a pub landlady.

That Kira somehow found her way home - more than 100 miles away - is amazing enough.

But the puppy's front left leg was still healing after being broken in four places in a road accident then reconstructed with metal pins.

"The vet hasn't got a clue how Kira managed it. I don't know how she got all the way from Hambleton to there," said a still-stunned Jen.

Kira was eventually taken in by a member of the public and police were able to trace her owner because of a 'lost' notice one of Jen's customers had put on the internet.

"You would have thought Kira would have been quite a lot worse than she was.

"She wasn't too thin.

In fact she wasn't bad at all considering," Jen said.

"But she was absolutely filthy. One of the first things we did was give her a good bath!"

Her children, aged ten, 11 and 16, gave Kira a 'big cuddle' and burst into tears, she added.

They were thinking of getting another dog when Kira turned up.

"Now she doesn't leave us alone. She follows us everywhere and she panics if she can't see us.

"She just likes being constantly beside us," Jen added.