It was our fifth day out, travelling through the Kruger National Park, South Africa.

Our planned route for the day:

We had planned to travel from Mopani to Phalaborwa, which is just outside the Kruger Park. Planning to stay the night in Phalaborwa and then the next day returning back into the Kruger Park. 

Leaving Mopani:

We came across this Impala buck alongside a wide expanse of river: 

Then we noticed some hippos also, lounging along that river: 

Moving on:

We stopped the car to watch these two elephants for a while around a man-made waterhole. 

And a little further on, we spied this elephant in low bushes: 

Handsome huge fellow isn’t he?! 

Been adventurous:

We decided to explore a side road and landed up in an open parking spot, which faced a panoramic view of animals grazing in a wide open field, with bush in the distance: 

Elephants in the background: 

 

Then some zebra grazing closer (in the middle ground): 

And then there was this herd of buffalo in the foreground: 

  

Aaah, then we noticed:

One bull buffalo, which came out from the rest of the herd. 

He came and stood in front of our car! Not so far from where we were parked in the dusty parking lot. 

He confronted us looking so fierce. I suppose he was only doing his job of protecting his herd. But even so, he made us nervous looking so mean, with his eye direct on us. 

It was when he looked like he would charge us that we decided to start the car and get right out of there, before he had any ideas of rushing at our car! 

You can see how nervous I was... I took this photo quickly, by the foreground blur!

PS: That buffalo looked so mean, I used him later in an oil painting… you will see that later in this Kruger travel series.