A group of road-tripping friends were forced to make an unexpected stop when a Southern African python – or rock python – blocked their path in Mozambique last month.
“I couldn’t believe it. I had seen a snake in captivity, but I had never seen one up close,” Thomas Bell told News24.
Bell was part of a 12-man entourage traveling back to Ballito, north of Durban.
They had been in Mozambique to celebrate a friend’s farewell.
“I was first in the convoy driving with my boat behind me. We came down a corner and it was lying across the road. We obviously stopped and everyone got out to have a look,” the 21-year-old explained.
As soon they stopped, the reptile slithered underneath Bell’s boat.
The men then tried to remove the snake from the boat by gently tugging at its tail.
However, the reptile wasn’t going to leave that easily.
It quickly slipped away and tried mounting a Land Rover parked behind the boat.
“When it moved onto the bonnet of the car I was kind of confused and nervous because we didn’t know what to expect,” Bell said.
Snake catcher Nick Evans cautioned against disturbing pythons.
He said although Southern African pythons are non-venomous they have the ability to “inflict a nasty bite should someone try catching it.
“If left alone, you’d be fine.”
In an attempt to get the snake off the car, one of Bell’s friends quickly jumped in.
He slowly reversed the vehicle, which encouraged the snake to slide off the car and slither into the nearby bush.
