Still to be avoided, but not nearly as dangerous as i first thought. Sorry.
I tell ya, it sounded a lot like a rattler with the echoes coming out of the hole. When i looked in and all i saw was fangs, i assumed the worst. I didn't want to find out for sure the hard way.
2 members of my party were rattled at by a small/medium sized rattlesnake living on bedtime for bonzo at fortress yesterday. It was living inside a small horizontal crack on the second pitch of bedtime. Nobody was bitten, but it sure scared the poo out of me, and i thought i should try to warn others.
His location was about 10 feet into the second pitch inside the small horizontal 1.5 feet right of the main crack. Although it's possible to safely bypass said snake, there is a tempting jug there that is probably used by a large percentage of the people who climb the route as both a hand and a foot.
The rattle also had a very unfamiliar sound coming out of the small crack. It sounded like more of a buzz than a rattle, for a moment i mistook it for an insect.
There was a fair amount of poo inside the hole, so that is probably a regular hangout for him.
Please be careful when climbing this route!
*Edited to reflect reality more accurately
