A stare-off with a wild elephant taught me a valuable lesson

You certainly have respect for an elephant when its tusks are just a metre away.

It’s dusk in Thornybush Game Reserve, part of the Greater Kruger National Park in South Africa.

Hold your nerve, stay still and keep quiet.Credit: Getty Images

I’m travelling with five others in an open-sided, unroofed safari vehicle on an evening game drive, and we’re on our way back to camp. Upfront is our guide, Brad, and tracker Laurence, from Masiya’s Camp at Royal Malewane Lodge.

The Greater Kruger National Park refers to a co-operative of private game reserves on the border of the national park. The members determine their own policy regarding game conservation, such as leaving the reserves unfenced for the free movement of animals.

Big male tuskers can be beautiful, but frightening.Credit: iStock

We’ve seen plenty of elephants so far. I’m in awe of the beautiful but frightening male tuskers who can be emotional, easily angered. Their mammoth bulk means it’s not an unimaginable task for them to use their tusks or flanks to tip over a truck. This is rare, though possible.

Late into the drive, we spot a gigantic male steadily eating its way through grass metres from our car. The sun is setting. As it gets rapidly darker, he works his way towards our stationary vehicle.

At this point I think, well, he’ll move away now, once he realises we’re blocking his path.

He doesn’t. He keeps on coming. And I’m in the closest seat, his tusks pointed towards me and inching nearer. I could touch him if I stretched out my arm.

He looks relaxed, flapping his ears occasionally. But it’s impossible to really know. A loud noise from our car, a sudden flash of light or an unexpected movement might spook him.

Fortunately, I’m with a group of experienced safari-goers. They know to stay absolutely quiet, and not start clicking cameras or turning on flashes.

I don’t dare move, even to subtly take a photo. I barely breathe. One of my companions uses a night exposure on her phone to take a picture of me. When I see it later, the expression on my face is one of (slightly) amused horror.

Amused, because being up close and almost personal with an elephant is not my usual Friday evening entertainment.

As you can guess, I am not crushed to death. The elephant ambles away after a long few minutes, in search of grass, not humans.

Brad has been softly whistling throughout, so this elephant realises there are people nearby. He jokes that he has not lost anyone in many years of guiding, but maybe this was close.

Local elephants have grown up knowing that the safari vehicles won’t hurt them. In the days when man used to hunt wild animals on foot, we were more of a threat.

But animals that have come from the Kruger National Park in the north can be more aggressive, as they’re still illegally killed for tusks up there. (The private conservancies finance their own canine squads to successfully stop poaching.)

Wild animals shouldn’t be provoked. You would think that was a no-brainer, but Brad tells stories of badly behaved guests, such as the woman who started clapping and screaming to wake up sleeping lions so she could photograph them.

Safaris are for grown-ups, I think, although children of all ages are allowed.

The very next morning, we have a potentially more dangerous encounter. A female lion wanders up to our parked vehicle and hides in its shade.

It turns out that she is escaping from the amorous advances of a male lion. But he’s not deterred. He slowly stalks her. While she is lolling about underneath us, he comes right up to the person sitting in the same seat I’d been in the night before and stands there, a metre or so away, staring into her eyes.

It feels like an awfully long time before the female runs off into the bush, and he coolly lopes after her. Was he angry because we were blocking his way? Or just letting us know who’s who?

My companion is overcome with emotion. Having a face-off with a lion was not on her dance card.

There’s a strong element of trust in these encounters. Trust that the guides know what they’re doing. Trust that your fellow travellers won’t start acting like idiots.

And trust that the animals feel secure enough that there’s a harmony in human-animal interactions.

It is, after all, about respect.

The writer was a guest of Royal Malewane.