When Western Gazette series reporter Anne-Marie Baker was told she was going to meet a celebrity, she got a little excited… but what greeted her at her destination was a six-foot, hairy llama called Kuzco.

Her assignment was at UK Llamas on the Dorset/Somerset border, a place the South American creatures can now call their home.

She said: “Hob-nobbing with the stars was what I had envisioned when I started out in journalism, along with a bit of glamour and quaffing champagne.

“But then I arrived in Mosterton and met Kuzco, along with a whole field of assorted llamas.”

But Kuzco was a celebrity – of sorts – being heavily involved in promoting the Walt Disney film, The Emperor’s New Groove.

She found that the movie star and his colleagues, who take tourists, stressed businessman and young offenders trekking along the scenic pathways of the Jurassic coastline, have a double life.

UK Llamas is particularly involved in pioneering work with children with special needs, and they are used as animal-assisted therapy to help children with autism.

And despite not quite being Brad Pitt, the hairy celebs did have the power to get to a girl’s heart.

Anne-Marie said: “As I left, I saw a sign on the gate reading: ‘Warning: these animals will capture your heart’, and I must admit even my animal-fearing heart was a little bit softened.”