Original subtitles

They call this place the land of great thirst.

The great Karoo Desert in South Africa.

We are in one of the most inhospitable places on Earth.

10 participants, whoever can stay the longest, wins.

It's pretty simple.

Oh, I found the baboons.

There's ten of them, but I only have five arrows.

This place is dry, dry, dry.

The sun's beating down on you every day.

I'm so tired.

And I'm so thirsty.

Oh, man.

I really don't feel safe drinking this water.

This is a place to be, if not feared,

treated with a lot of respect.

I changed my mind!

Oh, look at the size of that thing.

There's a big herd of wildebeest right there.

Rhino tracks.

Meat back on the menu, boys.

They call Cape Buffalo the Black Death for a reason.

They'll just straight up kill you.

We don't control the game.

Here we go--flooding.

This is nothing compared to what's coming.

It hurts so much, man.

It's freaking ice.

So the question is, how strong of a mind

do you need to have to win this?

Whoo!

What the did I get myself into?

A long, cold night.

The last one to tap walks out of here with 500 grand.

This is one of the hardest things

that a person can do in their life.

Oh, my gosh.

It's another great day in Africa.

Hunting is not going well,

so I'm gonna have to try to catch fish.

This should do it.

Check this out.

I caught a fish.

It's extremely rare for it to rain

this time of year in this location.

Staring at it won't help.

I'm gonna go take a bath.

So I feel no pressing need to build a shelter.

Just laying here on this rock, enjoying the sun.

It's rained enough that this bush over the top of me

is starting to drip through.

It's absolutely down-pouring.

I'm soaked.

All my stuff's wet.

I'm no longer snug as a bug in a rug, guys.

I checked around for dry tinder.

I can't find anything.

I've been thinking about my father

the whole time I'm out here.

Maybe the storm happened for a reason.

Hey, this is Douglas.

I'm officially tapping out.

I feel that this whole experience was an expression

of gratitude for my dad.

Being wet out here is a dangerous situation.

I need to start to think seriously

about making a more permanent shelter.

Ooh, yeah, I'm tired.

Friends, I just...

basically fainted.

I was going to show you the progress with the GoPro.

I raised the camera up a little bit,

stumbled backwards into the case,

and fell into the bush.

I did that while well-fed and well-rested,

but I neglected water.

That is a huge giant signal to me to drink water,

take a break, stop working

on the--on the digging.

I woke up disoriented and like, where am I?

What am I doing?

I'm like, oh, yeah, and I'm alone.

It could have been extremely bad.

If I--if I had done that somewhere else,

that could have been--

you know, who knows?

Off a cliff, into water.

I could have cracked my head open.

That's a huge bummer.

And a huge wake-up call.

Let me go back to my--

my tarp.

Drink water.

Lie down for a bit.

That was harder labor than I've been doing.

And I honestly haven't had a lot of water.

Foolish of me, because I think

the cool weather is a little deceptive.

You know, it's cool and misty,

and you don't feel like you're dehydrated.

Very unwise.

I fainted in the best possible place.

I fell back into a sturdy, non-spiny bush

that kept my entire upper body

from touching the ground at all.

If that bush wasn't there, I would have gone down hard,

and given the terrain,

I would have landed on a large boulder.

I could have broken my back easily.

I could have broken my neck easily.

I could have cracked my head open easily.

I got very lucky.

All right, nice, inviting tarp

with a bunch of warm clothes and a blanket.

Doesn't sound too bad right now.

Hydration, rest, doctor's orders.

Drink a good deal of water.

Purify some more.

I'm lucky I fell into a bush.

You think about so much stuff when you're by yourself.

So many things go through your mind, like all the food

you could eat-- movie theatre butter popcorn,

dark chocolate Raisinets,

and a cherry Polar ICEE.

And then cookie dough.

Cookie dough is very high on my list.

Spaghetti or lasagna.

Strawberries, blueberries, kiwi.

Speaking of, I could go for cheesecake.

Fudge brownie batter.

Chocolate chip pancakes.

Garlic bread.

Hands down.

Mmm, mmm.

I could go for a Snickers bar too.

Those are mainly the foods I've been craving.

I haven't really craved too much of anything else.

Oh, all right, we better get up.

I need to go hunting again.

Oh, I'm tired.

It's a great day, though.

Thank goodness it stopped raining and the wind

isn't blowing hurricane 3 winds.

In the first 10 days, I was doing really well

by harvesting a warthog, catching a fish.

And now I'm exhausted from the storm.

The warthog is running low and I am rationing,

but I'm eating less and less every day

so that it goes farther and farther.

I definitely have to get something killed soon.

Holy crap, guys.

Oh, my God.

Look. Look.

Oh, my God, where is it?

Look, it's a giraffe.

Oh, my God.

I think there's two of them.

Oh, my God.

I guess I didn't even think I'd see a giraffe.

Look at them run.

They're goofy.

That's wild, guys.

Don't get to see that every day in Montana.

I heard something down here.

I might be able to get a shot at one.

Oh, they're gone.

Shoot.

So close.

Man, they have good hearing.

Terrible eyesight, but great hearing.

Part of me is like, hmm,

I should have taken a shot at those warthogs.

The other part of me is like, that was far, way too far.

Just wound it and have it suffer all day.

That's not OK with me.

So I didn't take the shot.

It is what it is.

I didn't get a warthog.

Get over it.

Move on.

I reviewed the GoPro footage

and realised...

if I had just--if I had done

that exact same thing almost anywhere else

in this part of the landscape or any other

that I've been over the last two weeks,

the results could have been very bad.

So it's not a chance that I want to take

to happening even one more time.

I need to think hard about my overall safety

and the future of the rest of my life.

My ego wants more than 14 days.

It wants a month.

It wants two months.

It wants a win.

But this is a dangerous place to be

when you are completely capable at 100%.

It's an extremely risky place to be

if you unexpectedly lose consciousness.

Any number of things could happen to you

that would not only end your stay,

but could end your life.

I've just got to sort of acknowledge my limits.

I think it's more than water.

That was a giant sign from my body

that something isn't working right.

The number of days isn't what matters.

The rest of my life and my loved ones are what matter.

It's time to make that call.

This is Dug North.

I'm officially tapping out.

This is my last day here.

It's been a hell of an adventure, for sure.

I think that it's best if I--

if I call it quits.

Passing out is crossing that safety line for me.

I've never dealt with the dangerous animals

that are here-- the venomous snakes,

scorpions, this huge list

of potentially life-threatening or certainly hazardous things.

In the end, it--it was none of those that took me down.

There are things about our bodies that just happen.

And ultimately, that's what's gonna send me home.

I made a promise to my wife that

I would only stay in so long as it felt

relatively safe to do so.

But that relative line was certainly passed

when I fainted unexpectedly.

So as much as I value this, and as much as

I want to keep going, the rest of my life with Jules

matters more to me.

I've spent a lot of time in my life trying

to achieve things to prove to myself

that I'm a worthwhile person.

I would have loved to have of won.

I stayed 14 days.

Does that mean I'm worthless?

No, it doesn't mean that.

And I think recognising that is a big step for me.

I feel like I've overcome quite a few things out here.

I've overcome a lack of food.

I've overcome living in a primitive manner,

in a completely unfamiliar environment.

I've overcome my desire to build things perfectly.

I don't have to win or set some record

in order to be a worthwhile person.

I can apply myself, do my best, and that's enough.

So all of that's sort of

a little new kind of confidence,

and that's--

that's a really nice thing to feel.

Sunshine feels great.

It's been cloudy and rainy for days,

so I know I can't complain, though.

All the other seasons of "Alone"

had so much more moisture.

We just had--it was just unexpected here.

That's what was unique about it.

After the storm hit, I realised that

I need a long-term shelter,

so I'm gonna go ahead and build one.

Here we go.

We're getting further in the season.

The weather's going to be getting colder and colder.

Having a warm shelter is a great idea.

So this is the spot.

I'm going to build my permanent shelter.

The sun rises right there so it gets

the first sun in the morning, which during the winter time,

that's great.

This is much more sheltered than where I have been staying

from the prevailing winds.

I'm gonna start on the layout here

and make sure that I'm actually square

before I start laying stone.

We'll make this our new home.

I'm gonna build a rock house out of shale stone.

Two.

It's going to be about 5 foot by 10 foot.

Move this this way.

It's gonna take a lot of work, but I think it will pay off.

And I feel like I have the calories

to build it right now.

OK.

Move back one inch, and I should be

right on square.

In this area, building a shelter out of stone

just makes sense because it's a material

that's readily available.

This shelter is gonna be built by traditional dry stack,

where you have an inside stone wall

and an outside stone wall with fill.

The stone here is not perfectly flat on both sides.

It's convex. It's curved.

So I'll use sand in the middle as a filler

to take care of the uneven edges of the stone.

The other advantage to that is that it keeps

the wind from being able to penetrate the shelter.

This is the most unbelievable bandanna ever.

The technique has been around for a long time,

and it works very well.

The type of shelter I've chosen to build

is going to be a huge calorie expenditure.

But the nights are getting colder,

so having better protection from the wind and a shelter

that can hold some heat will actually help me

to conserve calories, and I'll be very comfortable.

That rainstorm that we had was completely unexpected.

I would have loved to have been

in a cozy shelter for that.

Nice.

That storm reminds me of a time

I was on a survival trip with my mom and my brother, Enoch,

and a group of students.

We had a really long hike,

and we were exhausted.

We had these military rain ponchos that we could

put up as a rain shelter.

We looked at the sky, and it was clear.

So all of us chose not to do it,

except for my mom.

Well, the middle of the night, the clouds rolled in,

and it started pouring rain.

And it didn't stop.

Everything was wet.

It was miserable.

And I remember my mom was all cozy

in her little shelter on dry ground.

She likes to prepare for everything.

And so I was wrong not to put any energy

into building a shelter.

So, Mom, sorry about that.

I'm gonna call that a day on the shelter.

It's a sunny day.

Oh, the sun feels good.

The rain kept me locked up in my shelter.

I need to do some hunting

because I haven't hunted for three days.

I'm gonna go and explore my territory a little bit deeper.

I should learn more about this area and its animals

and their behaviour.

Oh, my God.

There is an antelope.

This is what I'm seeing right now.

And there is no way I can get to him

within the bowshot range.

Looking straight at me.

He says, I see you.

In order to have a sure kill shot,

I have to be within 30 yards being the furthest.

If I can get it, I wouldn't have to worry

about food for a long time.

.

I feel disappointed in myself.

I am not consuming enough food.

I need to find another way to get food fast,

or I'm not gonna be able to last.

Going to collect buffalo thorn leaves for a supper tonight.

When I was in university, I met my wife, Dina.

Unlike me, she's white.

Our relationship was a bit of a secret,

because in that society,

dating somebody who is not my nationality

is not well received.

We decided if they're not going to let us stay together,

then we're going to stay together.

Our relationship pushed me to start

breaking those chains, the chains that

I have to obey society rules.

I got this amount of...

buffalo thorn leaves,

just a tiny bit in my pot.

As an experiment, after the collapse of Soviet Union,

it really divided people a lot.

It was sort of like a racial cleansing.

In certain areas, group of Kyrgyz

would go and kill people of other nationalities.

And I am not Kyrgyz.

My nationality is part Uzbek and part Uyghur.

It was a very scary situation.

We already had our oldest daughter, Medina.

We felt in fear for our lives, so we made a decision

to leave Kyrgyzstan.

I don't even want to think what would have

happened if we never left.

We probably would have split up.

Our kids would have been discriminated.

I think it's done.

I don't think it would have been a happy life at all.

I will do anything for my family.

Almost like eating strange spice flavour potato chips.

I could eat more of that.

I would say a very African meal.

I have been rolling a lot of rocks,

and for some reason today,

I'm back in the scorpion business.

This right here is catfish, I think.

I've got my mouse out fishing for me right now.

I walked back over to my poles,

and I'm gonna put this on my other hook.

Awesome.

This is exactly what I was hoping for.

I don't know if that rain, the thing was hiding out,

and the scorpions disappeared.

They're back out.

This is exciting.

When the big storm hit, fishing shut off for me.

But it steadily cleared up.

And I hope that I'll be able to be successful

with fish again.

One of the big decisions I'm having to make

is whether to spend my time fishing or hunting.

I've had periods where it's been really

difficult to get fish, but I plan to wait

a little bit longer to go hunting.

I've got a scorpion and a mouse on hooks this morning.

I'm very optimistic.

And with that, I think I'm gonna go

keep working on my shelter.

The shelter project, it's very labor intensive.

Just hope that I can find the calories

sooner than later.

Building this structure,

I'm doing the very thing

that a lot of people sitting on their couch

are saying, oh, no, look what Nathan's doing.

This is what people do right before they tap out.

There you go.

But personally, I feel like

I do have the calories right now.

It's gonna have a long-term benefit, and it will be fun.

And that's a big part of the reason I'm here.

Just out here building a fort like I'm 12 years old again.

Building forts as kids was just part of our culture.

Some of the best memories for me

are the summers that our entire family

lived in a teepee.

My mom ran that household so well.

We had so much fun.

We'd spend hours in the evening

just listening to her read to us.

We would come back with cuts and scrapes.

She would doctor us.

She just dedicated her life to making our experience

as children just amazing.

I'm gonna go check on the fish lines.

Right now, my mom's in her 80s.

She's always been so engaged in meaningful work

for people in need.

Nothing yet.

As she's gotten older, she can't do it anymore.

And she's struggling with her memory,

and it's been a big challenge.

I've thought about my mom

every day that I've been out here.

And while I'm out here, I want to honor her.

I'm really looking forward to getting home

and giving her a big hug.

That's good enough for today.

Looks good.

So I have my bobber.

I'll leave it right now.

All right.

We can still do push-ups.

That's good.

I always like to make sure I can pull my bow back

before I go out.

OK.

Oh, it's getting harder.

It's getting harder to pull my bow back.

OK, we're going hunting.

See how we feel.

With losing weight, I can tell I'm getting weaker,

but I can still pull my bow back.

So it is super important to hunt as many days

as I can before there's the day where

I can't pull it back.

And so I walk a loop to see if I can

find animals that I can shoot.

It's fairly flat walking,

so I don't burn too much energy.

Where are the warthogs?

Should we protest?

We want warthogs! We want warthogs!

I'm in a pickle because I have no idea

where the warthogs have went.

And I can't find any animals that

a 50-pound bow can take ethically.

Oh, I see something.

Wildebeest.

I can't shoot this one either.

I'm worried that if I can harvest a teeny warthog,

somebody else has something bigger, like a gemsbok down.

Somebody else has a sable down.

But I came in as the underdog with people doubting me,

people doubting my skills.

And I feel that they don't see everything in me.

Tomorrow-- we'll try again tomorrow.

I'm making a loop back to camp.

I just want to check my bobber line.

Surviving the storm definitely had an impact

on my mental state of becoming stronger,

knowing that if I can endure that, I can endure a lot more.

It's hard to be out here knowing

that you're getting tireder and weaker and hungrier.

We'll get through it, right?

Keep on keeping on.

It just takes a little bit of courage

and you can do anything.

I'm tired.

We went really far.

Probably shouldn't have gone so far, but we did.

Did a big loop.

It is what it is.

Wild adventure.

Let's go get the fishing line.

You guys, my bobber floated and is snagged in the weeds.

So I don't want to snap it off.

I'm gonna try not to.

That's interesting.

Oh, my gosh, I have a fish on.

You guys, I have a fish on.

I need to go easy.

I need to go easy.

Oh, my gosh.

Oh, it's a catfish!

You guys, I got a catfish.

Holy smokes.

Hi, little buddy.

Look at you.

Oh, cool.

Look what we got.

And I caught him right from my shore pond.

That's exciting.

Look.

Mwah!

Oh, my gosh, we are having catfish tonight, guys.

So awesome.

OK.

OK.

OK. What about this?

Oh, yeah.

That's nice.

I made a little stove.

OK.

I am so excited.

It's a small fish, but it's great for one full meal.

And it's a huge energy booster for me.

Awesome.

We are having fish for lunch, dinner, linner, lupper.

We're having lupper.

It's gonna be so good.

It's a cooler day out for sure.

Got my rice and my salt.

Smoke.

I'm in the wrong spot.

Whoa!

That was dangerous.

Good thing I wasn't standing there.

Yikes.

OK.

Nothing's going well.

Everybody's OK.

Everybody's OK. All right?

We just got to gather the fish.

It'll be OK.

I was just gonna take it off too.

Wow.

That was way dangerous.

Can we get that in slow mo?

Whoa!

That was very dangerous.

I was seconds away from having rock shrapnel in my face

and potentially leaving through a medical emergency.

And I didn't think about it.

Rocks exploding because they're wet.

My game 100% would have been over.

You definitely have to be conscious

of every little thing you're doing out here

because anything can happen on "Alone."

You can be taken out in a second.

OK, all the fish is out.

We're not wasting any of this.

We're eating it all--

dirt and all.

Our feast--nice, nice fish and rice.

OK, we're gonna eat.

Mmm, mmm, mmm, that's delicious.

By catching the catfish, I am encouraged

that there should be more.

And it was caught on a set line that was just thrown out.

Therefore, very little energy went

into catching this catfish.

Happy catfish dance. Happy catfish dance.

So this is glorious.

This means I can stay stronger longer.

I can continue to pull my bow back

and continue to walk the loop.

I wonder if everybody else has a full belly,

or if they're eating grass.

It's very important to hunt.

I also have to do these walks to be mentally strong.

I just feel so much better being in the open space,

looking out into the safari plains

rather than being cooped up at my shelter.

OK.

Clean plate club.

Mmm.

Yum.

What a great day.

I had a dream last night.

I had long hair.

That was weird.

Already feels like I want to put a sweater on.

It's going to be cold night.

I would like to build a stove

so it would be safe to make fire inside of the tent.

I have to get food soon, but the weather has changed.

Nights are becoming colder.

I have discovered that the clay here is

good for making clay bricks.

I'm gonna make some bricks.

Yeah, that looks good.

My bricks are cooking nicely.

Fire inside of my shelter will provide me

with immense amount of comfort.

And it's extremely important in this environment.

To make the wood stove, I need bricks

as well as some wet clay as a mortar.

I will lay them out in a U shape

and put mortar between them.

That looks good.

I decided not to bring a blanket.

My strategy is that I am bringing a warm enough jacket

and warm enough overalls that will provide me

with enough warmth heat,

especially after I build a fireplace.

That's not so bad.

Three layers.

That's it for now.

It's going to be cold night.

It's nice to see stars again.

Ah.

I feel like a little speck-- little dust in the universe.

And the wind is just tossing me around.

I hope my wife's OK.

I hope my kids are OK.

I hope my grandson's OK.

I hope they're doing OK without me there.

So winning this competition means a lot to me.

Not just for me, because I have my--

my sister's kids with me.

My sister passed away when she was 40,

leaving two kids behind.

And her husband, he's got another family.

So these kids are almost like, they don't have any parents.

So I brought them to Canada.

But it's just too much for myself.

I'm--I'm the only one working.

I feel that I have to provide.

I have to support my family as much as I can.

I cannot quit my family.

I cannot quit that responsibility.

It's just in me.

They have a whole life ahead.

They need it.

I want for my family and for myself

a better, brighter future.

I've already given them a better future

by leaving Kyrgyzstan, but if I'm still able

to get to the higher point of leaving them

in a better place, then I shall do that.

And that's why I'm here.

I miss my sister a lot.

I miss her a lot.

But she's always with me,

always right here, always over there.

So help me take care of your kids.

Help me go through this competition.

Help me with it.

And I have this idea of getting them out of the den.

I need to have this work.

I'm hungry.

And it just sucks to know that I'm at starvation time

where I just sit around,

and I don't have anything to eat.