Day 60 – 14th March 2018 – Boranup to Denmark

Today started in an interesting fashion.  There was a lot of rain overnight and both Col and I enjoyed listening to the many frogs that woke up in the forest due to the rainful.  It was loud and a beautiful sound.  In the morning I made the comment to Col that I hope there are no frogs in the toilet when I go, and no snakes chasing the frogs in the toilet!!  And off I set on my morning walk to the toilet block.

As I neared the toilet block, I noticed on the path ahead of me a large snake.  It was smaller than the Dugite snakes we have seen and a different colour.  Lighter with a yellowish belly.  I froze a couple of metres away from the snake.  The advice is to stand still and give the snake a chance to slither away.  So I did.  I stopped dead and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  It was a Mexican stand off.  I was not moving, but nor was the snake.  Eventually I decided this was silly.  One of us has to move.  So I slowly backed away from the snake, then turned and walked back to the Caravan and told Col what I had found.

Col ran to grab his camera and we made the trek back to the toilet, and there it was lying right where I had left it (glad I didn’t stand there waiting or I might still be there).  So Col starts inching closer with the camera in hand, trying to get a nice shot of the snake.  I quickly reminded him of the Wasp video he made recently, where he kept getting closer and closer to the Wasp dragging the Huntsman Spider until the Wasp got angry and dropped the spider to fly after Col.  I suggested that this video could end the same way!  He ignored me

Col was pretty convinced that the snake was dead, as it was completely ignoring him.  Then Col comes up with a GREAT idea (please note that statement is dripping with sarcasm).  “I am going to grab a stick and poke the snake to see if it is alive!” Col stated enthusiastically.  Ummmmm What??!!  You are going to do what???!!!  I was not a fan of this plan.  Pretty sure that Snake 101 says, do not poke snakes with a stick when you are camping in the bush to determine if the snake is alive.  Now I haven’t studied snakes, but I am pretty sure this is an accepted rule.  But poke he did.  Col foraged around and found a big enough stick, then went up to the snake and gave it a poke.   The snake was in fact alive.  Luckily for Col it was a lazy snake and he just quickly turned his head to eyeball the man that dared to poke him with a stick when he was happily lounging about.

So at this point I was stepping well away from the action and decided I would happily return to van and use the port-a-loo instead.  The snake was welcome to stay put.  Col on the other hand just walked through the bush instead of the path and still went to the toilet.  There is a gap all the way around the floor of the toilet and I was a little paranoid that our new found friend might just slither in at any moment but Col wasn’t concerned.

I was surprised that I actually wasn’t that scared of coming face to face with a Tiger Snake.  Well not until Col decided to poke it with a stick of course.  But all in all it was an interesting experience and luckily it ended well.

So after the exciting start to the morning, we finished the pack up of the van (sans annex) and did the 3 and a half hour drive to Denmark.  We had a huge amount of washing to do after bush camping for 9 days and we both thoroughly enjoyed having long hot showers.