--- title: Raccoon Rides Alligator in Florida Ocala National Forest: Photo description: Chillest raccoon ever? canonical: https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-06-15T16:45:53.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:21:07.947Z og:title: What's This? Oh Nothing, Just a Raccoon Riding on an Alligator og:description: Chillest raccoon ever? og:url: https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What's This? Oh Nothing, Just a Raccoon Riding on an Alligator twitter:description: Chillest raccoon ever? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # What's This? Oh Nothing, Just a Raccoon Hitching a Ride on an Alligator by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jun 15, 2015 4:45 PM UTC by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jun 15, 2015 4:45 PM UTC Sometimes, really incredible things happen in nature — like this moment when a raccoon was seen riding on top of an alligator: > [](https://twitter.com/WFTV/status/610117797985800193) A man named Richard Jones captured this image in Florida’s Ocala National Forest Sunday, WFTV [reports](http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/man-snaps-unique-picture-raccoon-top-gator-ocala-n/nmcmC/). He and his family were walking by the Oaklawaha River looking for alligators, and when his son walked through some palm fronds to try to get some photos, he apparently startled the raccoon, who then hopped onto a nearby gator. “I snapped a lucky picture right when the gator slipped into the water and before the raccoon jumped off and scurried away,” Jones told WFTV. “Without the context you’d think the raccoon was hitching a ride across the river.” So, sadly, this is not a picture of a super-chill raccoon bumming a ride from his equally chill gator friend — but Jones still calls it “the photo of a lifetime.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/"},"headline":"What's This? Oh Nothing, Just a Raccoon Hitching a Ride on an Alligator","datePublished":"2015-06-15T16:45:53.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:21:07.947Z","description":"Chillest raccoon ever?","url":"https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/","keywords":["Newsfeed","animals"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3921354/raccoon-rides-alligator-florida/","name":"What's This? Oh Nothing, Just a Raccoon Hitching a Ride on an Alligator"}}]}] ```