76-Year-Old Gogo Sees Her First Elephant During SANParks Free Access Week

• SANParks National Parks Week opened Kruger National Park to South Africans who face financial barriers to entry
• Visitor Jenny Mun-Gavin encountered a group of local grandmothers at Lower Sabie during her trip to Kruger
• One 76-year-old grandmother experienced seeing a live elephant for the very first time in her life

A moment inside Kruger National Park during SANParks National Parks Week has left South Africans reflecting on who truly gets to experience the country's natural wonders.

Jenny Mun-Gavin, a 76-year-old who has visited Kruger since her childhood, shared an account of her recent visit during the annual initiative, which grants South African citizens free day entry to national parks across the country. The scheme aims to make protected areas accessible to those who might not otherwise afford the entrance fees.

During her visit, Mun-Gavin crossed paths with two groups that stayed with her long after she left the park. The first was a contingent of well-behaved school children experiencing the reserve, and the second was a vehicle filled with elderly local women, known as Gogos, at Lower Sabie.

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A lifetime of waiting

It was one of those grandmothers who stopped her in her tracks. The woman, also 76 years old, told Mun-Gavin that she was seeing a live elephant for the very first time. At her age, on the same soil where these animals have roamed for centuries, she had never had the chance before that day.

According to reports, for Mun-Gavin, the weight of that moment was impossible to miss. Having grown up with access to the park as a fixture of her life, she found herself face to face with the reality that for many South Africans, that kind of access had simply never existed. The same landscapes, the same animals, yet entirely different experiences shaped by circumstance.

She praised SANParks for creating an opportunity that bridged that gap, even if only for a week, and for giving people like that grandmother a chance to connect with a piece of South Africa that belongs to all of them.

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National Parks Week serves as an annual reminder that South Africa's wildlife heritage is a shared one, and that the barriers keeping some communities from experiencing it are worth confronting.

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Source: Briefly News