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Mother’s shock as she unpacked her bag after a trip to Spain
By Chris Brooke, Daily Mail
As she unpacked her suitcase, Jean Cox was startled to discover an unexpected – and unwelcome – souvenir of her trip to Spain.
There, curled up under a pair of trousers and apparently asleep, was a four-and-a-half feet long snake.
After one look at its black and yellow markings, a terrified Mrs. Cox decided on a tactical retreat.
She closed the suitcase and dashed out of the room, fearing her uninvited guest could be venomous.
‘It was the shock of my life and I thought I was seeing things,’ she said yesterday.
‘I was about half way through unpacking and jumped when I saw it lying there.
‘It looked asleep thankfully, because if it had been moving I would have died.’
Fortunately for 47-year-old Mrs. Cox, the creature turned out to be a harmless Californian King snake, more used to eating rodents and vermin – and other snakes – than attacking humans.
It is thought to have slithered into the suitcase as Mrs. Cox packed at her daughter’s apartment in Madrid.
The reptile had survived four days and a plane journey locked in the suitcase without food, but was apparently none the worse for the experience when an RSPCA inspector arrived to take it away from Mrs. Cox’s home in Gosport, Hampshire.
Mrs. Cox had travelled to Spain with her husband John and 17-year-old son Michael to collect their 19-yeaar-old daughter Rachael, who had spent four months studying in the Spanish capital.
It was while she was helping her daughter to pack her belongings that the snake, probably the neighbour’s exotic pet, made its move.
‘I had packed the case myself in Rachael’s apartment and then zipped and locked it up immediately,’ said Mrs. Cox.
‘I’m terrified of snakes so it sends a shiver down my spine thinking how long it might have been loose in the apartment before crawling inside the case.
‘Rachael had actually been to the case before I unpacked to get a pair of jeans but decided to leave the rest to me.
‘Thankfully she didn’t see it in there. She is worse than me and I dread to think what would have happened if she had found it.’
The female Californian King, which can grow up to 8ft, has been passed to a specialist in exotic snakes.
RSPCA chief inspector Paul Williams said: ‘We get calls about lizards, and spiders found in bunches of fruit which are not uncommon. But it is not every day that you have to deal with snakes in suitcases.
‘It would have been a bit of a tricky one to explain to customs officers had the snake got out of the suitcase and made an appearance at the airport.
‘It has done really well surviving during the flight. They go into a semi-hibernated state when they are cold and it must have experienced a big temperature drop in the plane’s hold.’
Had the snake slipped off to try to start a new life in Gosport it could have fared quite well – the Californian King can tolerate temperatures of as low as 5c, making it one of the few that could survive in the wild in Britain.
| Hisstory of the Californian King |
 The Californian King snake will eat any other snake, even the highly venomous rattlesnake.
It is not venomous, but kills prey by grabbing them with its small teeth and smothering them.
It can live for 15 years and go for two weeks without water and six months without food.
The snake comes in many colours, including chocolate, yellow, black and albino.
In April a Gloucestershire veterinary nurse gave a pet Californian King the kiss of life after it stopped breathing during an operation.
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