Have you ever had a run in with a dangerous wild animal?

[AbsentmindedWoman]

I'm sipping my coffee and dreaming about going camping in the wilderness. Somewhere really remote. It would be awe inspiring, but also in reality I'd be too scared of getting lost or being eaten by some of the local wildlife so will probably never actually do it.

Has anyone been wilderness camping or similar? Did you have any narrow squeaks with snakes/ jaguars/ crocodiles?

Also had vehicle chased by an angry mum Elephant in S.Africa I hadn’t noticed her baby walking up to the car.

Also a little unnerving to be surrounded by a load of Highland Coos in West Highlands, who proceeded to sit on the road around my car, calf’s and adults just staring silently at me whilst chewing I didn’t want to freak them out by beeping so waited (hadn’t seen another car for miles) they were beautiful though 😍

A wild cobra slithered over my foot- ( had been sleeping under the table in an outdoor restaurant) Found a scorpion in my shoe ( but shaking them out every morning was something I knew to do).

DH was adamant he'd stepped on a stonefish in the Caribbean. Then he started with supposed chest pains. All very dramatic but short lived.

Got stung by a jelly fish in Tulum, felt like my arm was going to die off, tingling burning pain, very weird, so painful. Absolutely hate jelly fish, yuck

Another awful experience is walking (well, running) through a wild kind of trail in the Everglades, the most mosquitoes I have ever seen, terrifying, can't stand bugs!!

We never seen it but, we was camping in Botswana, it was very cold night and we didnt sleep very much, we woke up in the morning, all around our tent was leopard prints, was quite scary because we didnt sleep much and didnt hear a thing

Had a Dartmoor pony invade our tent in the middle of the night, friend had gone for a wee and not zipped up the tent, I woke up to a pony head inches from my face....not fun.

There is a camp ground near where we live in the middle of an alligator habitat. The scouts camp there, I asked if it was fenced off from the gators and they looked at me like I had two heads, then I looked at them like they had two heads for suggesting it

Hard pass

Do Highland cows count?

vinegaroon

JFC!!!

Yep! In a shopping centre in spain and a wild bore had found its way from the 'campo' and was ramming the doors trying to get in!!

An charging elephant tested my driving skills once. I've also had a run in with a black mamba, thankfully it was docile - shudder...

I'll wait until tomorrow to google vinegaroon, I need my sleep tonight

Came face to face with a wolf in Yosemite, both walking towards each other along a footpath. I stepped off the path and let it pass!

Mind you, the red corn snake in the kitchen of a house in Tooting was a bit of a surprise!

@Aprilwasverywet

Do Highland cows count?

I reckon if I’d got out to hug one of the calves it would have got a bit fiesty cutest cows either.

*ever

I decided to move it and went to shoo it away when it reared up on its backlegs and started to box me with its hooves.

Sorry but 🤣

Ok as there are a few Zambia stories here I will add mine

Many years ago we spent a long summer visiting dad who was working there, Snakes in the garden were quite common but the house boy was handy with a machete

We went to Victoria falls for a few days, trip down the Zambezi our boat was rocked by hippos coming up so they moved closer to the shore only for a bull elephant to come charging out at us

Monkeys were everywhere at the hotel, snatching food

Sadly back at dads house in the copper belt we received news that a friends child had been snatched by a croc while they were visiting lake Luanga

We were on the edge of the bush and wild dog fights of 60 plus outside were not uncommon

It was an interesting place to visit as an 11 year old

@TranquilityofSolitude it was probably a Rinkhals. Their party trick is to play dead. It must have been terrifying!

Stayed at a safari lodge in Zimbabwe and we were sleeping in a rondavel hut which consisted of an outside wall and then a space at the top for ventilation with the straw roof a bit higher on struts . During the night we heard scratching on the wall like something trying to repeatedly climb up and falling down again. Next morning hairs stood up on the back of my neck when we found lion poo on the terrace of the hut.

One roasting hot day in Norfolk, I was playing outside on my bike and was drawn to a nearby Bush as I could hear a really loud rattling sound. As I peered into the Bush, I swear I came face to face with a rattle snake. Nobody believed me but I SWEAR it to this day. I'm sure it was probably an escapee from a zoo or something. Not sure if this counts!

Some wild monkeys jumped on my head when I was at a temple in SE Asia - I've no idea why they chose me and no one else as I didn't have food! I handed my camera to the nearest tourist and had some photos taken No harm done at all - they were just in the mood to explore - so it is a fond memory really.

I came across a few semi-tame wild animals in Australia (e.g. wild kangaroo that was quite keen on the idea of being fed, despite being somewhat off the beaten path of tourism) and had a narrow miss with a cassowary in suburban Queensland (they're notoriously dangerous, I scarpered the moment I saw it!). I've seen wild crocodiles, but from a boat, so completely safe.

But probably the incident that came closest to killing me was in middle bloody England. Coming round the corner on a rural road and finding a solitary, escaped dairy cow standing in the middle of the road. It was a good job I was paying attention and had good brakes - I imagine that hitting its legs would have caused the body to go straight through the windscreen.

I was staying in a overwater bungalow & left my swimsuit to dry on the balcony. Woke up at 5am (jet lag) & realised said swimsuit had disappeared. Spotted it under another bungalow in the sea. Swam & got it & as I started to climb up the ladder my sister who had woken up looked petrified. I turned around & a bloody shark swam right past me (didn't make a sound). It was a "nice" shark breed but I still shat myself.

I was showering in an Australian campsite when I spotted a red-back spider in the corner of the cubicle. It just stayed there while I finished my ablutions.

In India, some friends forgot to close their hotel window and we returned to find their room ransacked by monkeys. They'd swung on (and broken) the mosquito nets, raided all their stuff and thrown it everywhere, eaten all their snacks and, for some reason, squirted suncream everywhere.

Baboons in Sun City in South Africa, we had armed guards with us though so we’re pretty safe.
A giraffe sat on my car at a safari park, wasn’t the giraffes fault, it was in the road and as I waited some idiot tried to overtake and trapped it between our cars and it panicked.
In a Florida at a conference we were doing a team building canoe thing and all of a sudden we were told to get out of the water as there was a big alligator.
Some of the horses on Dartmoor are pretty scary and I’m used to horses