Shivapuri Baba

Shivapuri Baba, also known as Swami Govindananda Bharati, was a Hindu saint who reportedly lived from 1826 to 1963, making him 137 years old at the time of his death.

According to the biography written by John G. Bennett, Long Pilgrimage - The Life and Teaching of the Shivapuri Baba, Shivapuri Baba was born in the Indian State of Kerala as Jayanthan Nambudiripad in 1826 and became a seeker after truth at the age of 18.

He was one of the first spiritual teachers to travel to the West. His travel was financed by the fortune left to him by his grand father, with whom he promised to embark on a 'around the world pilgrimage'. His journey initiated within India. Having traveled to the four corners of the sub-continent, and after meeting prominent Indian philosophers, he continued his journey towards the west via Pakistan and Afghanistan.

He walked on foot for the most part, passing through the Holy cities of Mecca and Jerusalem. Upon his arrival in England, he was invited to the Buckingham Palace where he lived for several years serving as the yoga instructor to the Queen. After the Queen's demise, he continued his journey across the Atlantic where he also met U.S president Theodore Roosevelt. In the book by John G. Bennett, Shivapuri Baba is said to have crossed the Andes mountains, through lake Titicaca, before reaching the Patagonian retreat of Argentina from where he sailed to Japan. He returned to India in 1915. The entire 'pilgrimage' spanned over four decades.

He spent the last decades of his life in Nepal, where Bennett visited him twice in the early 1960s.