Thanks again for your replies, Il have to be very selective about what I say about the incident itself as unfortunately we have had to start legal proceedings.
A few people have asked how far the cattery is from our home. As the crow flies it cant be more than 3 miles.
The problem is our house backs on to acres of farmers fields. and fronts onto (about 150m from) the A55 in North Wales.
For anyone who is not familiar with North Wales, this is the main trunk road servicing the whole of the North Wales coast - very busy.
I can count on one hand the number of occasions Harry dared to venture to the front of the house.
He is a rural cat and very inexperienced with Traffic.
The A55 lies between our house and the cattery. There are only two flyovers in the vicinity and both again are busy.
The Cattery also is secluded and surrounded by farmers fields, if he headed for the fields and avoided the A55 he wouldn't be going in the right direction for home.
Harry hates being in the car, i would have thoguht there is no way he would have been able to plot a route of where he was going? he was very distressed, I just cant see how he would find his way home, there are no familiar streets or routes, just miles and miles of farmland and forest - and the A55
We have been round most houses and large farms with posters of Harry.
We have heard stories of cats going missing from catteries but they have always been with the owner present, Harry hadn't seen us for three days, if (like we think) he thought we abandoned him, why would he stick around?
We are also aware of a lovely elderly gent about 1.5 miles from the cattery who is looking after 22(!) feral cats, we go there most feeding times in the evening seeing if we can spot harry, there are two lookalikes but alas no Harry yet.