A Surbiton woman was shocked to discover that the short trip to her daughter's school had been enough to turn a sheltering exotic pet into a metre-long char-grilled snake-steak.
School-run mum Lesley Muir first noticed the smell of gently roasting snakemeat on the way to drop off four-year-old Flores. Unperturbed, she completed the delivery.
It wasn't until later - when thick smoke started pouring out of the engine and the barbeque smell turned rank and overdone - that Mrs Muir thought of getting the problem checked out at a local garage.
"We thought it must be some kind of animal but it was really a shock to find a snake," she said.
"It's certainly the weirdest thing that has happened to me in quite a long time."
It turned out the snake (presumably an abandoned pet) had snuck under the bonnet of the Muir's Renault Megane seeking shelter from the rain.
It basked comfortably on the engine manifold until that fateful morning, when the heat generated by Mrs Muir's school-run turned its new-found refuge into a fatal flambé.
Mechanics scraped out the snake's remains free of charge, but the family say they're still living with the smell.
It is uncertain whether Mrs Muir will have to report the incident to her woman car insurance provider, or if it will have an effect on her motor insurance quote prices in the future.
Lee-Ann Bass, spokesperson for the woman car insurance specialists at CoverGirl, said: "School-run mums don't have the best reputation, but I don't think we can blame Mrs Muir for the snake's death.
"This was just an unfortunate - and pungent - mistake, which shouldn't impact on her car insurance premium."