Actor Josh Lucas is engaged after proposing to his girlfriend following a terrifying confrontation with a mountain lion.

The Sweet Home Alabama star was on location shooting a movie in Big Sur, California when he came face-to-face with a mountain lion.

Lucas admits he saw his life flash before his eyes and the petrifying experience convinced him to pop the question as soon as he returned home.

During an appearance on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno on Thursday (05Jan12), host Leno asked the actor if he had indeed proposed, and Lucas confirmed the happy news, saying, "I did."

He added, "I knew (she was the one) on a kind of interesting trip that we took. I was doing this great movie in Big Sur, California and it was a very, very low budget movie. Often times they put you up in these terrible, little hotels and so they said you have $30 a day of a hotel allowance. And I used that money to find my own place to stay... And there's this guy... who has an eco resort... We stayed there and had our first night. It was absolutely wonderful.

"And in the morning we hiked down and got picked up by production and went to work and everything was fine. Except for as the week went on, the movie started shooting later and later and on a Thursday night we ended up getting home at around 3 o'clock in the morning... So my girlfriend at the time and I, luckily we both had flashlights, so we began the 20-minute hike up the hill. It was black - pitch black...

"So we get to the top and we get into that lovely little trailer and immediately she starts hyperventilating and just can't even breathe. And I'm like, 'Baby, what's wrong?' and she's like, 'I'm so scared, the most scared I've ever been in my life because I know that we are about to be attacked by a mountain lion.' And I'm like, 'Honey, this is Big Sur, there are no mountain lions.'

"The next day she stayed in the trailer, I hiked down and went to work. And we worked that day at this beautiful house in Big Sur and all over this house were signs that said, 'Beware of mountain lions.' What to do in case you see a mountain lion - all the noises you're supposed to make, clanging, yelling, make yourself as big as possible...

"That night, I then go home at 4 o'clock in the morning and realize I don't have a flashlight... And as I'm going up, I get to the point where I realize I can see nothing... I am now going along hand by hand... and I hear, totally serious, two big breaths, and six feet above me, I see the very slight glint of the eyes of a huge mountain (lion) and I literally proceed to do what I had just read in the instructions. And I started screaming and yelling and literally being as crazy as I could be... It padded off and just slowly went away and I worked my way into the trailer and I got in and I decided at that moment that this woman was the woman for me."

Further details about Lucas' fiancee were not available as WENN went to press.