Help rescue 3 Greek street cats!

Poetry time over. Here’s the story…

Me and my partner Chloe recently visited the beautiful island of Santorini back in September and like the love struck fools we are, 3 street cats captured our hearts. Donald, Bramberry and Lucia all grew up around Black Diamond Resorts of Akrotiri, Satnorini during the summer months and made it to 5 months old against the odds. Fending for themselves every day and without vaccinations or medication these siblings just want the chance to live a stress free life where, they don’t have to fight for their lives.

These cats are so loving and full of life we couldn’t bear to leave them on the Island with so little chance of survival. The average street cat in Santorini lives for just 2 years. The locals (of which there are an estimate of around only 3-4 thousand once the seasonal workers and tourists leave) are so sparsely spread out and have so little resources, they simply don’t have the capacity to look after the island’s cats. Sadly this is a story that is repeated throughout the Islands of Greece.

However we have a plan for our 3 little critters. With the help of our 2 friends (Anna and Kostas) who run the hotel we stayed at, we are going to foster Donald, Bramberry and Lucia until we can find them their forever homes here in the UK. All we are asking for is a little help in getting them over here and taking care of them until we find them permanent homes.

Adopting and fostering cats from Santorini is no easy process, nor is it cheap. Food, vaccinations, pet passports and travel are proving to be hard to fund! We’re struggling to cover all the costs and so here we are asking you the internet and the cat loving community for a bit of help.

Our mission begins on the 6th December. Due to Brexit, we can no longer fly cats directly into the UK from Greece, the furthest they can go from is Paris. On this day me and Chloe must hire a campervan and drive to Charles de Gaulle airport (we cannot take our car as it would be far to small to transport 3 cats and their litter trays fairly).

Upon arriving at Charles de Gaulle we must park up, leave the campervan and fly to Athens. Here we will meet Anna and Kostas (of whom are currently looking after the cats at their own expense), pick up the cats and return to Paris. From here we will drive back to the UK in the campervan (after a 4hr flight and 3hrs being transported around the airport, we feel they will need somewhere big enough to stretch their legs before being driven to the UK).

We simply don’t want to leave these cats to battle it out in a desolate Santorini during the winter! We also do not want to drop them off at a cat shelter somewhere either. Cat shelters are currently incredibly stretched and under-resourced, thus most cannot cope with more cats being lumped on them.

We want to do a good thing and save 3 beautiful cats and we hate asking for money but given how expensive this endeavor is, we feel gofundme is our only option. Anna and Kostas in Greece have done all they can financially and we would like to help them out. They have been incredible and their generosity has saved these cats. We simply would not have got this far without them. However Greek hospitality jobs do not offer the kinds of wages that are conducive with funding such philanthropic missions without being left short.

The money you send will be used for the following:

We have been using a combination of credit cards plus ours and Anna & Kostas's savings.

Any money you can give to this cause, myself, Chloe, Anna and Kostas would be hugely grateful (as would Donald, Bramberry and Lucia).

Thank you so much!

Lots of love - Will, Chloe, Anna, Kostas, Donald, Bramberry and Lucia.

Update! Thank you so much to those that have donated so far. We really appreciate all your help with this. Genuinely, it means so much that you have chosen to support us.