I had never heard that sound before and couldn't see the animal that made it. But I knew what it was. Finally I saw the rattlesnake just two steps off the mountain bike trail. He was moving a little. His rattles were up in the air. And he was pissed. My first concern was to get both of my dogs on the leash.



It's odd to have finally heard and seen a rattlesnake rattle after all these years in rattlesnake country. I was beginning to think that they were just a chimera. Prior to this week I had seen two rattlesnakes in eleven years of hiking and biking in rattlesnake country. Fortunately they are dormant in the winter. They lie there in "the borrowed likeness of shrunk death." In the summer, our early starts in the morning keep the rattler issue manageable.

This was the third rattlesnake this week. Apparently I've landed smack dab in the Rattler Capitol of Colorado. I knew this campsite was too good to be true.

A couple days ago I was driving by a semi-dormant rattlesnake on a dirt road. I turned around, hoping it would be safe to photograph him. Then a pickup came by and ran the snake over. Now I could take some real closeups and write it up on the blog as death-defying dedication to my readers. (Do you think they would have bought it?)

I even fantasized putting a "Donate to this blog" button right after the scariest closeup. I could have said the money would go solely to my "Green RV Energy Fund."

But the digital daguerreotypes were unusable. It would have been pretty naughty of me to try this trick on my loyal readers. But the Devil made me do it. I mean the serpent.