Wayne Bolton, founder of One Land Love It NPC, believes that our National Parks serve as the official custodian of the natural heritage of all South Africans, Africans and indeed, the international community. As a SANParks Honorary Ranger he has been involved in the official voluntary arm for 10 years and seen firsthand the critical role that our parks play. 

SANParks are doing a sterling job of exercising their mandate and the OLLI Team recognised this in the first expedition 2015/2016 which connected all 19 SANParks, cycling 6000kms around SA in 80 days by mountainbike.  Through the 2017 OLLI Frontier Rhino Ride, 2000kms in 1 month cycling from Nelson Mandela Bay through KwaZulu Natal to the Mozambique border, Wayne aimed to showcase the supportive role of our private game reserves and their invaluable contribution to South Africa's conservation landscape - he focused on a new frontier currently the target of the rhino poaching scourge.

However, the responsibility of preserving out wildlife, flora and fauna will always rest with us as humans, civilians and custodians.

Hence our slogan #jointcustody

It begs the question of each one of us:

“What have I ever done to contribute to 

the sustainability of my environment”?

On both expeditions Wayne's children cycled part of the route with him; and his wife, mother, father and father-in-law formed the support team emphasizing the message that the responsibility of our natural heritage is in the hands of all generations.  This is an ordinary family making a difference and leading by example.

By embarking on the One Land Love It Expeditions (#OLLI), Wayne hopes to have provided ordinary people with an opportunity to make such a contribution by supporting his efforts. Wayne physically and symbolically linked various parks around our country - 8000kms in total.  In so doing, he pointed to the fact that we form part of the chain with SANParks, private and provincial parks to protect our natural heritage. We can achieve synergy by working together.
 

The well-publicised slaughter of our Rhino is the thin edge of the wedge – if we don’t stop it now, the elephant and lion will follow (and indeed, are already).

We are at a tipping point and need to do something about it. We need to move with urgency from an attitude of caring to doing!

In the eternal and well-worn words of Edmund Burke:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”