A walk in the woods......with snakes

A couple days ago my friend Tony called me and asked if I could help him out by taking some pictures of waterfall canyon for him.
He picked me up from work in his stick car (if you want in on the joke check it out here) and we went on our merry way.

The walk up the canyon was pretty uneventful. Tony had a cheerful conversation with himself while I wheezed and puffed my way up the hill.

As I walked, I thought about my favorite travel author Bill Bryson. He too had taken a similar hike. Well not exactly similar because he had hiked half of the Appalachian trail whereas I was taking a dinky 10 min walk up the canyon but still. I felt we were in a similar situation. 

'Finally with a weary puff, you roll over, unhook yourself from your pack, struggle to your feet, and realize -- again in a remote, light-headed, curiously not-there way -- that the view is sensational: a homeless vista of wooded mountains, unmarked by human hand, marching off in every direction. This really could be heaven. It's splendid, no question, but the thought you cannot escape is that you have to walk this view, and this is the barest fraction of what you will traverse before you've finished.'(36)  

a WALK in the WOODS

I couldn't have said it better myself Bill, I couldn't have said it better myself. 

After we reached the area where Tony wanted to take pictures, I dropped my gear and got to work. Basically Tony just wanted a couple nature shots for a brochure he had to make for class.

Me: So want kind of pictures do you want? Classic nature pictures or me pictures?

Tony: What's 'me' pictures?

Me: Me being creative and doing whatever the heck I want.

Tony: .... let's go for that one.

Tony's a good sport.

When I was finished, we headed out. Poor Tony had to endure the humiliation of not just carrying my camera bag, but also carrying my purse. Like I said he was a good sport. I promise I'm not normally this wimpy. It's only because I hadn't had a chance to eat lunch that day because work was crazy so I was running on empty.

Half way down the trail we encountered this guy in the picture below. We wouldn't have seen him if it weren't for Tony's x-ray vision. I was oblivious to everything except for the mirages of food in the distance. For those of you who can't tell, this is a baby rattlesnake. They're unfortunately the most dangerous because they don't control their venom yet. So if they strike something they pump all their venom into their victim rather than just a little bit.

Needless to say I was terrified and Tony thought it was adorable. I refused to move from the big rock I was standing on until it had slithered off into the bushes and I couldn't see it or hear it anymore.

We made it down without another encounter, but you can bet my eyes were glued to the trail the whole time. Moral of the story is snakes are icky.