Wildlife one comes across in ones travels is one way to know you’ve arrived somewhere new. In Singapore, it was the geckos that climbed on our walls to take refuge behind the artwork.
In The Gambia, it was the pouch rats that jumped over the corrugate fence in my back yard or the enormous snake that I can still see in the circle of my flashlight as I was walking to my latrine one night–or that monkey that makes for a terrific tale. Later for that one.
If you’re driving across West Virginia, you might see a black bear dash across the road like I did last summer when I was heading to Washington, D.C.
If you had been in Noonamah Tavern in Noonamah, Australia last Sunday, you’d have been drinking a beer with a crocodile acquaintance. Noonamah is near Litchfield National Park not far from Darwin.
The crocodile might have been underage though since it was only two feet long. According to the AP article on Salon.com, a grown-up can be 16 feet, much harder to get into a bar.
Three guys who saw the crocodile outside the tavern thought it would be neat to bring it inside and have a few. The crocodile didn’t drink, though. They taped its mouth shut. Not a particularly hospitable way to treat a guest, but it was a crocodile with sharp teeth after all.
Happily, the story ends well. There is not a drinking and driving accident to report or anything like that. The salt water crocodile, a protected species, is now at a crocodile farm where it may have come from in the first place.
I wonder if it has come up with any jokes yet? “There were these three guys in a bar. . .”