Ray Stevens Smokey Mountain Rattlesnake Retreat

Well me and Doris went on vacation we decided we needed more than recreation
So we enrolled in a Bible camp retreat.

I got the directions and we took off, it only took six hours to get completely lost
way back up in the mountains of East Tennessee.

Well it was getting real dark and I was starting to fret. Doris said, “Look yonder, bet that's it.”
& she pointed to the lights of this little church way back in the brush.

An old man met us, I said, “Just two” & he escorted us down to the very first pew
& I said, “Doris I don't think this is the right place”, She just said, “Hush.”

Well they preached some sermons and sang some songs then they preached some more
and went on and on. Nearly wore me out, I'd had about all I could take.

Then they pulled down the shades & things quieted down.
This guy next to me punched me & said, “Here, pass this down”
I turned and looked, and son of a gun, he handed me a snake.

Oh the night that me and Doris went running through the forest
Way back up in the hills of Tennessee.
Yeah we started making tracks, when they broke out the diamond backs
Sure scared the devil out of poor old Doris and me .

He said, “Take it man don't you believe?” I said, “I believe all right, & I believe I'll leave.”
And I reached for Doris but she done fainted away white as a sheet.

Now I couldn't pick her up and I couldn't find the door
And them rattlers were crawling all around the floor.
And friends that's when the spirit hit my feet

I started running down aisles and bouncing off walls
like somebody teed off a new golf ball in a tiled bathroom
Friends, I mean, I was moving on.

I'd run past Doris every minute or two trying to shake her, to wake her, but it wasn't no use
For a while there, I thought the Lord had called the poor thing home.


Then somebody dropped a big-un’ in her lap, & Doris came to and something in her snapped
She grabbed that thing by the tail and commenced swinging it around her head

Then she gave it a crack like Lash La Rue, and it’s head came off and sailed across the room
Then she did a tap dance on the rest of them suckers till they was all dead.

Well I grabbed her by the hand and we headed for the car
And she hollered to the preacher,
“I don't know who you are or where you came from or how you ever learned how to preach.
But, let me tell you something, you old raggedy scamp
You don't know nothing about running no Bible Camp
And me and my husband are on our way to Daytona Beach.”

Oh the night that me and Doris went running through the forest
Way back up in the hills of Tennessee.
Yeah we started making tracks when they broke out the diamond backs
It scared the devil out of poor old Doris and me.