Local community bands together to find couple's missing pup

Rachael Masterson and her partner Chris arrived in Northern Ireland on Monday August 7 from Northumberland, England.

They arrived in their Winnebago for a one month holiday with the hopes of travelling around the island with their two Border Collies.

On Tuesday August 8, they arrived at Binevenagh Lake at around 5pm. The road up was very bumpy so there was a lot of banging in the van before they pulled over at the top.

Rachael explained that their two year old tricolour female Border Collie, Joy, slipped her collar as soon as they got out of the van but the couple wasn't initially concerned.

"She's usually off the lead for walks and stays with us," Rachael explained. "We walked from the carpark to the edge, only about 100 m away, admired the view for a moment and when we turned around she had disappeared."

The couple, along with the local community, spent nearly a full week looking for Joy until she was thankfully found yesterday evening (August 14).

The couple said the local people were "incredible" in helping locate their lost pup.

Rachael continued: "We will never be able to thank everyone enough. We had countless people on the mountain searching and sharing news, thousands of facebook shares and posts, messages, phone calls offering food and water, offers of free facilities at a glamping site, mountain rescue experts, four lots of drones, one thermal, and even the police turned up to check in with us.

"We also had two very special young people ferrying us around in their car on their days off.

"We are overwhelmed with love and kindness. We would move here tomorrow.

"We had so many good people praying and thinking about her. I'm sure that positive energy brought her home. We were not leaving the mountain top until we got her back."

The couple say that their pup Joy - full name Joy Badger - was found near the caves at the waterfall. Joy was tired and a little thinner but otherwise unharmed.

Rachael added: "She has a few scrapes but she is not bad at all considering she was gone nearly a week. We cannot thank the people of Northern Ireland enough.

"We're all resting and recuperating before setting off again on our travels around this beautiful isle. Bless you all."