Lookout 3: View down the coast

We climbed the last few steps to the top of the cliff where it was now quite exposed eucalypt forest. As we walked along the top this is where I heard the first rustle, and saw a fairly small thin dark coloured snake in the grass. Andy now began to sweat, more so when I spotted the next small snake a few metres further along. Then it was the big one, I heard more rustling and looked to my left to see a huge 6 foot long jet black snake slithering in the opposite direction to us. We stopped and watched it glide along, I tried to get my camera out, but it had gone by the time I was ready. Andy was now like the scene out of Airplane with sweat pouring down his face. The big decision of keep going, or turn back was discussed at length. It was then that our trainers and shorts made out legs feel very vulnerable and we realised we had no reception on the phone, so if one of us got bitten we’d have a long way to get help. There was absolutely no-one about and that moment was probably one of the scariest I’ve had (for Andy, replace ‘probably’ with ‘definitely’). We then decided that noise was good, to try and scare anything on the path away by the time we got there. I was crying with hysterical laughter as we both marched like soldiers along the path, if we had to stop then we marched on the spot – looking back it was hilarious!! Lookout number 3 couldn’t have come soon enough but we didn’t really concentrate on the great view, we just slumped against the safe wooden platform. Here, to our amazement were a man and boy with bare feet, to whom this walk was probably not even worth worrying about. The man kindly told us that most snakes won’t bother us… it’s just the big taipans we need to watch out for because they will chase us if we disturb them. Oh, how we laughed! So on we marched back down the cliff path to lookouts four and five.