A 28-year-old chimpanzee gazed at the open sky for the first time ever at a sanctuary in Florida after being caged her whole life, according to Save the Chimps.
The largest chimpanzee sanctuary in the world, Save the Chimps, released a video showing Vanilla, a female chimpanzee, utterly amazed and “in awe, gazing up at the open and vast sky above her for the first time in her life,” according to the organization’s website. In the video, Vanilla was hesitant to walk outside her cage, but when an alpha male named Dwight greeted her with a hug, she made the first step to freedom. (RELATED: Adorable Video Shows Chimpanzee Meeting Her Newborn)
The chimpanzee is a survivor of a now-closed research lab in New York where chimps were confined in small cages, according to CBS News.
“She had never been outside of a lab cage or the garage-sized enclosure she was transferred to in California,” Save the Chimps said, the outlet noted.
Vanilla was previously transferred to a California sanctuary where she lived “inside a chain-link fence cage with no grass and very little enrichment,” CBS noted. Last year, she and several other chimps were transferred to Late’s Family on Air Force Island, one of the biggest family groups at Save the Chimps.
“Vanilla is settling in very well,” the organization said in a statement, according to CBS News. “When she’s not exploring the island with her friends she can usually be found perched atop a three-story climbing platform surveying her new world.”