Afternoon was giving way to early evening when a wriggling serpentine form appeared on the tarmac ahead of us.  For some reason, I knew exactly what it was we just straddled between the wheels.  I stopped as quickly as possible and pulled over to the shoulder, and we hopped out and ran back to the snake.  It was a juvenile Eastern Diamondback, cute as a button and trying to cross a wide and dangerous stretch of open road.  We were very happy to save this little rattler from death under the wheels of a pickup or a logging truck.

This was Tracey's first Diamondback, so we were all very pleased for him and of course, I'm always happy to see another one.  Come to think of it, this was my first juvenile EDB, 14-16 inches in length and no doubt born the summer before.  It seemed a little on the thin side; perhaps it was still looking for its first meal of the year.

After we finished our photography and had sufficiently marveled over the little snake, we helped it to the other side of the road in the direction it was originally heading.  A great find to cap off the day.

During the afternoon the sky had clouded over and now it was began to spit a little rain.  We were having trouble finding a place to camp, and in the end decided that a night in a motel would be most welcome.  A good night's sleep would do us all good.  In the morning we would head down into the Apalachicola National Forest.