WILDLIFE VOLUNTEERING: THE RED FLAGS MOST PEOPLE MISS

Isabella Drenthen - Evening campfire at Vikela Kruger - African Conservation Experience Reviews

Ellie Sheahan

Country
🇦🇺 Australia

Length of trip
14 Nights

Travel year
2024

I had dreamt of travelling to South Africa my whole life. I arrived full of idealism and left completely transformed.

During my two weeks with African Conservation Experience, I split my time between Moholoholo Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre, nestled beneath the Drakensberg mountains, and the Phinda Wildlife Research Project in KwaZulu-Natal. Two very different places, but two unforgettable experiences.

At Moholoholo, I was immersed in the harsh reality facing wildlife in South Africa. Animals arrived broken, snared, poisoned, orphaned, displaced. I witnessed baby hippos without mothers, vultures poisoned by laced carcasses, a leopard and her cubs pushed too close to human homes. Despite the emotions this would evoke every single day, the staff there showed up anyway. They cleaned, fed, stitched and carried. There is no glory in this work, no spotlight, no promise of success - but, in my opinion, it is work of the purest kind.

At Phinda (meaning the return) I saw what conservation looks like when it's done with people, not just for them. I tracked rhinos, monitored lions, assisted with anti-poaching efforts and studied cheetah populations. I watched a rhino sedated from a helicopter and lifted to safety by a team of people utterly determined to give a species another chance. I reviewed camera footage of moments so rare they felt sacred.

And then there were the people I met along the way! Volunteers from every corner of the world, researchers who had given years of their lives to this land, and conservationists whose devotion genuinely moved me more than any landscape ever could.

South Africa didn't just meet my expectations. It asked me bigger questions than I knew how to ask myself - about conservation, connection, and what it really means to belong somewhere.

Read Ell's full blog to find out what answers she found:

By Ell Creative Blog

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