This week, Ohio’s Brad Ryan and his 93-year-old grandmother Joy Ryan completed a journey over seven years in the making. It all began when Joy confided to her grandson that she regretted how little she traveled throughout her life. To remedy that, the two decided to visit every one of the nation’s 63 national parks. Fast forward to this week, and Brad and Joy recently completed a trip to the National Park of American Samoa, the only U.S. national park south of the equator and the most remote park in the country.
“Grandma Joy made history today as the oldest living person to visit every U.S. National Park!” Brad said on Instagram. “What more can I say? It was the greatest privilege of my life to be in the driver’s seat for Grandma Joy’s Road Trip. We defied erroneous assumptions about the limitations of aging. We defied financial and logistical constraints. We even defied a pandemic. And you might have noticed that I accidentally made Grandma Joy the superstar I always knew her to be.”
It’s a trip neither will soon forget.
“We have so much to share with you from the National Park of American Samoa,” he said. “But today we are soaking up every ounce of joy coming our way from around the world. Your love and support was the fuel that got us to the finish line. We love you all.”
Joy is now the oldest living person in history to visit every U.S. national park.
“Just knowing that she had never seen deserts and mountains and the ocean and these incredible, wild places on Earth, it just felt like a responsibility I had to her to make sure she had some memories to tuck away in her life story as well,” Brad told Good Morning America.
