In what sounds like a tale from Aesop’s Fables, a tortoise managed to elude a peckish lion at a luxury lodge in Zambia.
John Sampson, a guest at the Royal Zambezi Lodge situated on the banks of the Lower Zambezi River, captured footage during a game drive of a lioness unsuccessfully, trying to get hold of a small tortoise.
Naturally the tortoise retreated into its protective, hard shell.
A video captured the persistent lioness grappling with the ball-like tortoise in her meaty paws. Using her powerful jaws to pry open the shell, the lioness never quite gets the right angle.
According to Royal Zambezi Lodge’s Facebook page, the tortoise would slowly attempt a getaway each time the bored, defeated lion would drift off to sleep, but the lioness would awake and have another go.
In some images, the puzzled lioness can be seen casting an eye towards the still retracted tortoise, contemplating her next tactic.
‘My favourite show is the lion intently watching the tortoise as it tried to make its escape,’ photographer Sampson told the UK’s Daily Mail. ‘Seeing this was hugely exciting as it’s such a rare sighting.’
The moral of this safari story is that the underdog – or tortoise, in this case – can beat the king of the jungle… It just requires a lot of patience!
Image: John Sampson via Royal Zambezi Lodge/ Facebook
