Kacey Connolly

I travelled with African Conservation Experience (ACE) for a month, spending two weeks at Moholoholo Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre followed by two weeks at the Vikela Kruger Conservation Experience, and it was such an emotional and incredible experience!

The thing I was most worried about before this experience was navigating the airport by myself, collecting my bags, and not missing my transfers. So it was very helpful having someone from the South African ACE team meet me at the airport to help me with everything! When I arrived at the airport, all the other volunteers and I sat down to have a talk about conservation with the ACE team member who met us.

When I arrived at Moholoholo, the staff sat us down to talk about everything they do and what surprised me most was learning about the poaching against vultures because it’s something you don’t really hear about. When you think of poaching, you think of a rhino being targeted, so to hear that poaching against vultures is such an issue and that they’re being poisoned to avoid revealing the poachers' locations was really interesting to hear. I even got to do some work with the vultures recovering from poisoning at Moholoholo, and when I did that work with other volunteers, it was really fun because the vultures just stand by and watch you.

My favourite animal was a serval who was in the group of animals that I was responsible for, and even though he was feisty, he was so sweet too. I really enjoyed working with him because he ate most of his food, which meant I didn’t need to clean up as much as the other animals who were less hungry! One of my other favourite animals was a black stork who would run around the sanctuary with his sticks, trying to make his nest!

The staff at Moholoholo were so funny and knowledgeable, and they really cared about you too. Even when I got ill during my time on the project, one of the staff members took me to a doctor straight away. Everyone there was so helpful, both with getting me better and with the work I was doing whenever I had questions. It was really nice working with one of ACE’s Wildlife Rehabilitation Placements too because they’re working alongside you, but they have so much knowledge already! 

After finishing my two weeks at Moholoholo, I moved on to Vikela, and the staff at Vikela were my favourite people. It was nice to have someone be so straightforward with what they were telling you because it meant that you knew what you were doing from the very start. The guide always made it clear what we had to do, and if you made a mistake, he’d teach you how to do it correctly. The work I did on the Vikela project was so new and different from anything I’d done before that I needed to be taught, and I’m very glad they were there to help me.

My favourite experience during my time at Vikela was the rhino horn trimming. Knowing that this horn trimming has to be done for the rhino's own benefit is very sad, but it was amazing to be a part of. It did make me cry when the rhino was being sedated, but you understand it has to be done in order to protect them from poachers. Watching the helicopter fly around so the rhino could be darted and sedated was also incredible to see. The best part was watching all of these clearly very experienced people do their job during this procedure, it made me feel like I was contributing to real conservation.

When I decided I wanted to go to Africa, I knew I wanted to do something different. I didn’t want to do a safari, so I started looking into volunteering instead. If I’m being honest, it was my mum who did a lot of the research into different companies. She came to me with ACE’s website, saying this would be the right organisation for me. I think she chose ACE because they were the company she felt she could trust the most to look after me. 

If you’re nervous to travel, I would definitely recommend travelling with ACE because the only things you do by yourself are the easiest parts. All of the aspects I was nervous about; going through the airport, knowing I was where I needed to be and checking the boards to make sure I was on time, were made so much easier by travelling with ACE. It’s so good to have someone tell you where you need to go and where you need to be. I feel like when you’re in a new country, or doing a new type of experience, that kind of support is the best way to travel so that you don’t need to worry, and you can just enjoy it!