An uninvited guest arrives

After a restful day off in Rodds Bay, the next morning we planned to jump the short distance around the corner to Pancake Creek. This will give us a head start on our journey down to Bundaberg the following day. The outflowing current is best for a 7am departure.

At 6:30am, I’m enjoying my first coffee of the day in bed when I hear a blood curdling scream from up on deck (Chez says it wasn’t blood curdling... but it was!)

“RICCHHHYY!!”

It’s the type of scream I used to wake up to on our long Pacific crossing. Those ones were just nightmarish hallucinations in my head that didn’t actually happen (I was having a bad time back then) - This one was not.

Dashing up the companionway stairs I see Chez in a state of heightened distress, which I initially think is either a dirty inky squid or a large flying fish that has somehow jumped on board overnight - this was not the case.

The scream inducing interloper was in fact an Aussie icon - one that throws unaccustomed Poms (like us) into a terrified state.

It’s a healthy looking, plump brown, patterned snake!

Now bear in mind, other than the occasional trip ashore in the tender, we haven’t actually been attached to land for over a month. This snake has swum out to us and boarded us overnight - and land is a good 4 to 5 hundred meters away on all sides.

Not knowing how venomous or aggressive it was, our initial thought is to get it off the boat - fast!

It’s curled up in the folded mat we use to cover the worn teak at the back of the cockpit. I gently lift the mat, which the snake helpfully slithers inside the folds of.

I then gently tip the mat onto the transom and shut the doors behind it. The curled snake gracefully flops out like a discarded length of thick rope.

Beautiful though it is, it cannot stay on board, so using the gaff I slowly try and flick it off the back - the snake makes one darting strike towards the pole - that’s enough for me to counter with a fast flick that sees the 1.8m serpent go flying about 5m away into the water.

That’s when the ‘fun’ began!

Obviously not ready for a swim, its head comes up and he (might have been a she, who can tell) starts rapidly swimming towards us again. There follows a disgusting awful minute or two of me repeatedly hitting it with the gaff and swearing like a demented drunken sailor every time it tried to get back on board. Each time it seems to re-intensify its efforts to return to the safety of the boat.

No mate! It’s my boat!

Quick thinking Chez suggests immediately raising the anchor and getting the hell out of there. We do this, and as Chez, at the helm, powers away from it, we see the snakes head sticking up about 30cm out of the water in the ‘ready to strike’ pose, rapidly heading towards us once again like an angry periscope. Thankfully our diesel engine at high revs is apparently fast enough to outrun a snake.

On calm reflection, and having eventually discovered that it was in fact a carpet python (…I’m quoting: “Non-venomous, makes a good pet”), we could possibly have dealt with it in a slightly less frantic and more humane manner. But at the time, we just wanted it gone!

Also, in hindsight, barefoot and boxer shorts was probably not the best attire for the job!

Both very shaky afterwards; All the hatches were open overnight (there being a bizarre lack of mosquitoes at present)…things could have been so much worse.

Back to more normal events: motored round to Pancake Creek without issue, dropped behind the reef, away from the pack so as to avoid any obstacles when we depart for Bundaberg in the dark tomorrow morning.