This video features the remarkable 65-year-old Rajan, the world’s last ocean-swimming elephant, who lives on a beautiful archipelago in the Bay of Bengal. Rajan, who weighs around 3.6 tonnes, once worked hard carrying lumber between islands, but he is now retired — although he still takes the occasional swim for fun.
It takes 10 years to train an elephant to swim, and it is no longer considered economically viable with the availability of modern transportation. However, elephants are still valued workers and this was reflected in the $US40,000 price that Rajan’s keepers paid for him.
They repaid this money through a variety of means, including hiring him out on photo shoots to photographers.