Walking with wolves. It's the latest novelty tourism experience on offer in southern Spain.

A local man from Almeria Province is offering a ramble in the woods where each person is assigned a fully grown wolf as their walking companion.

This is no ordinary dog walk.

In fact, these canines are not dogs but wolves.

In a remote corner of southern Spain, Miguel Ángel González Carrillo has started offering small groups the unusual opportunity of walking through the mountains with a genuine wolf pack.

The 47-year-old has raised three litters of wolves.

He invites groups to experience the call of the wild and interact with these beautiful creatures that once roamed freely through forests right across the Iberian peninsula.

In 2009 González Carrillo moved to the mountain village of Instincíon
He told his daughter that he was thinking about getting a dog but she suggested, half-jokingly, that a wolf might be a more appropriate companion given his rugged new environment.

When Carrillo stumbled soon afterward on a breeder offering a cub for sale, he decided that fates were aligning and brought the tiny creature into his home.

Thirteen years later, he now shares his home with three wolves, mother Kahala and her two fully-grown offspring, Sioux and India. The animals are registered with Animal Identification Registry of Andalucía.

The bond between González Carrilloand these creatures goes far beyond that of an owner with their pets - he is the leader of the pack.

The wolves jostle for his affection until he has to bring them into line with an eerily realistic canine cry, and they follow him without hesitation.

Four years ago he decided that as the wolves had had such a profound effect on his well-being, they might also help others.

He began to take the pack into cities to work with children with autism and older adults with Alzheimer's disease.

The Iberian wolf, a subspecies of the grey wolf, was recently added to the national list of protected species.

Carrillo would love to see these creatures recolonize the area and started his walking tours two years ago as a way of showing the public that humans should not fear wolves.

After several kilometers of undulating terrain, the path arrives at a beautiful clearing and the wolves, having perhaps spied a mountain goat, appear to be transfixed by the forest on the other side of the valley, and the participants reflect on their special day out.