Voice of Real Australia is a regular newsletter from ACM, which has journalists in every state and territory. Sign up here to get it by email, or here to forward it to a friend.Today's is written by ACM national agriculture writer Chris McLennan.
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Many people want to learn more about the Northern Territory.
How is it governed, is it really hot and sweaty, do crocs walk the streets - those sort of questions?
They complain about so little news coming out of the NT to satisfy their curiosity.
So when they learn I spent several years working up there, it is a chance for them to barrage me with questions.
Generally I am happy to answer them all.
My wife and I loved our time in the Top End and reckon not enough Aussies visit.
Probably the same goes for Tasmania.
Close as they both are, better to save your money for an overseas holiday thinking it's a better bang for your buck.
In the Territory, by far the biggest crowd who visit are grey nomads on their post-retirement pilgrimage around the nation.
And that's only in the dry season when the nights are cooler.
But one question took me by surprise the other day.
Are there lots of snakes?
Usually people asked about crocodiles, or stinger jellyfish, or crime.
I never saw many myself, so I had to think back to my best Top End snake story and here it is.
It all began when the power went out.
I was the resident news hound for the NT's fourth biggest town so the fact the traffic lights (all three of them) went out was big news at the time.
Businesses could not operate, household power was lost in the town, Pine Creek and other outback communities for almost an hour before it was fixed.
The town's electricity came from a gas-powered plant at a place near Darwin called Channel Island.
The island was once home to a leper colony, but that's another story.
The power travels on overhead lines about 300 kilometres and was often blacking out for one cause or another.
It was only the next day we found out the cause of this latest outage.
A snake.
You've all seen birds sitting on powerlines enjoying a chat, well that's sort of what happened here.
The hungry olive python had climbed a power pole to feast on a magpie goose.
On the way down with its prize, the snake had earthed itself somehow and electrocuted itself.
Working to track down the cause of the outage, Power and Water Corporation workers found the dead snake looped over a power line at Hayes Creek, about 150km north west of the town.
Apparently power outages like that were a common event in the NT.
"Animals such as snakes, bats and birds can come into contact with power lines," the corporation's spokesman told me.
"Strong winds can also cause outages when branches become loose and trees fall."
So there you, go my best NT snake story.
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