narrator: In the wild, the right skills can make
the difference between life and death.
- Agh!
narrator: Now, some of "Alone's" best competitors
are taking on a new mission.
- This is, like, some Indiana Jones-type stuff.
narrator: They'll have just three days...
- Whoa.
narrator: And limited tools...
- Here's the fun part.
narrator: For a build challenge devised
by one of their own. - Time is ticking.
narrator: At stake for the winner...
- Whoo! narrator: Bragging rights.
- You guys have your work cut out for you.
narrator: Tonight's challengers, Callie North,
72-day survivor from season three...
- Da, duh-da!
narrator: Britt Ahart, 35-day survivor
from season three and runner-up from season five...
- Look at that. One cast. Boom.
narrator: And Clay Hayes, 74-day survivor
and winner of season eight.
- Yeah!
narrator: Let the challenge begin.
- It's done.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- Lucas Miller here from season one of "Alone,"
where I lasted 39 days on Vancouver Island.
Whoo!
I got a boat.
Our three challengers this week have
a daunting task in front of them.
And they have four tools that they can use.
And they must pass three criteria.
Good luck, you challengers.
Let's see what you can do.
- Let's open this thing up.
- Very excited to see what's in it.
♪ ♪
- [exhales]
- Da, duh-da!
It's always like Christmas.
♪ ♪
- Got our envelope in here.
Let's see what the challenge is.
- This is always the exciting part.
- Let's see here.
♪ ♪
- "Your challenge is: build a wilderness watercraft."
If Lucas knew me any better,
he wouldn't have challenged me to go over the water.
- All right, let's see what we got to work with in here.
Got our saw in here.
This is gonna be handy for cutting
some of the bigger materials.
Got a knife.
And I've got some bankline here
and a big, very cheap tarp.
It's really thin.
This is gonna be interesting.
- And of course, the challenge is put forth by none other
than the famous boatbuilder of season one,
Lucas Miller, of course.
"To complete the challenge, your build must, one, float--"
very important for a boat--
"two, not leak,
three, travel 100 feet in water."
All right, Lucas, challenge accepted.
- All right.
- Let's get started.
- We got a lot of work ahead of us,
so let's do it.
♪ ♪
- This is gonna be fun. I can't wait.
♪ ♪
- So what I'm thinking is, I'm gonna build
a skin-on-frame kayak.
So we've got to build the frame first.
And so I might just cut some Doug fir branches
and cedar boughs for some of the ribs
and a little hoop to go around
where I'm gonna sit in this thing.
Let's see if I can't peel those and coil them around a tree
and let them dry for a while
to make the bends for the hoops on this.
While these are drying, I'm gonna go down
and get started on a paddle.
♪ ♪
I'm telling y'all, I'm gonna make a show
called "Wilderness Woodworker."
♪ ♪
Just gonna use a couple of wedges
to split off this excess.
♪ ♪
A little improvised drawknife.
♪ ♪
Actually working pretty good.
I like a fine, thin edge on my paddle
so it cuts through the water.
♪ ♪
They may have a better kayak than mine,
but I doubt anybody's gonna put this much effort
into a damn paddle.
♪ ♪
- So what I'm thinking is, build a raft.
First things first, let's start getting my materials.
You know I love my bamboo.
It's sturdy and buoyant.
So that's where I'm gonna go.
In between all the nodes, it's totally full of air.
I mean, it just makes sense.
I'm about 225 pounds, so this thing is gonna
have to be pretty buoyant.
I think that this should be enough to keep me afloat.
♪ ♪
So yeah, now I'm just lining up pieces for the bottom.
I take another one of my pieces,
and I'm gonna split it down.
And then I can put some on the top, some on the bottom.
And I'll lash it all together,
maybe at three different points.
I don't want to cut anything
until I'm ready to cut something.
Oh, my God.
I have to cut my bamboo with my knife.
Jeez.
OK, well, that's a issue right there.
I thought I was gonna be out here splitting bamboo,
but I have to split it with this thing.
♪ ♪
So that just automatically changed
what I'm gonna be doing.
My cross sections are gonna have to be whole bamboo.
This is gonna be what the underside looks like.
♪ ♪
Ah, [bleep].
Ooh.
That was a nice little slice on my finger.
I had my pinky in the wrong place.
♪ ♪
Yeah, that's lovely.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- I'm gonna build a Callie Kayak,
which will be expedited and hopefully strong enough
to hold me in the water.
I am going to make two tripods to work off of.
I just think it will be easier to have the kayak elevated.
♪ ♪
That's probably a good length.
I just want to create a simple skeleton structure.
It's gonna be, like, major baby kayak.
Definitely think Clay has an advantage
because he does all of this for a living.
But that's OK.
It means he's one to beat.
♪ ♪
Like, I have to even make sure I can sit in it.
I'd have to sit knees up to be in this, which is fine.
Now I want to do the ribs.
OK, so I've gathered a nice little bunch
of willow and alder here.
And these are gonna work as the ribs of my boat.
♪ ♪
I've been able to create my structure for the boat.
You can see here.
♪ ♪
All right, end of day one.
I actually feel pretty good about my timing.
I feel like I've gotten a lot done.
♪ ♪
- It's another a hot day, but I'm back at it.
I'm being very careful with my knife today.
♪ ♪
I lost time yesterday.
Cutting yourself-- it makes you take pause.
But I'm back at it.
I have 12 sections of 4 feet to go across.
I'm gonna lay all those--
boomp, boomp, boomp, boomp, boomp,
and lash them.
♪ ♪
I don't want to use the tarp.
I'm gonna do it without the tarp.
So if they use the tarp, I think I got
one up on them already, because I didn't need
that plastic piece of floating stuff.
And then if I took these long boards
and did runners underneath, man,
I like the little extra added buoyancy I'd get.
♪ ♪
[sighs] And there it is.
All right, so this is what I believe
is the final construction.
♪ ♪
I have no idea how it's gonna perform.
♪ ♪
- All right, I'm ready to get started
on the frame of the kayak,
so I'm gonna pick out my four biggest hoops down here,
pull those off.
I like a wide, kind of flat bottom kayak,
especially if you're gonna be out fishing in it
or pulling traps or doing anything
where you're gonna be moving around in the boat.
Having a wide, flat bottom really helps.
♪ ♪
I sure hope Lucas appreciates this craftsmanship.
That is shaping up good.
So now I'm looking at the lines.
I want it to be straight so it tracks right.
Taking wood off the stiff spots.
♪ ♪
Starting to look like something.
I'm gonna try to use this as the bow or the stern.
This is sloping down like this, which is--
could potentially be a problem.
♪ ♪
- [laughs] OK, Lucas,
I know you wanted me to build a yacht with this tarp.
♪ ♪
Well, let's just see.
I'm gonna be sitting in here.
The boat is coming together well.
♪ ♪
I don't really have any, you know, specific method.
I just am wanting to make sure that it's really watertight.
♪ ♪
I mean, it kind of looks like a boat, right?
♪ ♪
I just want to see.
♪ ♪
Oh, my gosh.
Wow.
♪ ♪
Look--holy moly, look how that tips to one side.
It literally almost tips all the way over.
Oh, my goodness.
I don't even know what to do about that.
It wants to go this way so bad.
I have a pretty serious issue.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- Today is day three of the build.
And the boat likes to tip this way.
It needs to be heavily weighted on one side.
I'm working on now, the outrigger.
I have this stick here.
It's gonna set on the top of the boat
and acts as a stabilizer.
I had made these two little boats
that were gonna go on either side,
but I think I'm gonna turn them into one kind of buoy.
So it's kind of like a little, like, submarine thing.
Boop.
I have these scraps of tarp
to make sure that it's watertight.
♪ ♪
It's ugly, but it will work.
Now I'm attaching it to the end of my outrigger post here.
So I need to connect my outrigger to the boat.
And I won't know exactly where I need it
to counterbalance the boat.
But I've carved this little piece of wood here.
And this is gonna act as a clip.
I can take the clip off and then move where I want it
and then clip it in pretty securely.
♪ ♪
The final step is making the paddle.
♪ ♪
- Got to get the frame finished and get the tarp on this thing
before the end of the day.
It's the last day I got to work on it.
I want my bow to be curved up.
Might have to build a fire and heat this up and bend it.
♪ ♪
This thing's got a sweep up like that,
which is pushing the bow down
when I try to put it into the frame.
So I'm gonna try to straighten this out...
♪ ♪
With a little bit of heat.
♪ ♪
Perty.
Look at that.
That's gonna be perfect.
I'm starting to get low on bankline.
I'm getting it down to the last little bit there.
♪ ♪
Where my tarp at?
Hopefully, I got enough of this to lace my tarp on there.
♪ ♪
I just made my nice, beautiful frame just look
like a freaking pile of trash.
♪ ♪
Just have to figure out what to do with the excess tarp.
I don't have much time left.
- I got my build. The sun is right there.
That's also making me think, when I'm out on the water,
I might like to have a little bit of coverage.
So I was just gonna do something really quick.
See, the clock's ticking on this challenge.
- Might have a solution for holding all of this on there.
- Coming to the end here.
Ugh, God.
I am struggling with this paddle.
- I might just use my smock, because then I have the option
of whether or not I want to be covered.
- It's done.
- [making swishing noise]
- [grunts]
- Mine is done.
- I like it.
- [grunts]
♪ ♪
- Three days ago, I gave Britt, Callie, and Clay a challenge.
They had to build a wilderness watercraft.
They had a saw, a tarp,
a knife, and some bankline.
They needed to complete three criteria.
One, the watercraft had to float.
Two, it shouldn't leak at all.
And three, it needed to travel 100 feet in the water
without any major problems.
So now, it's time to see how they actually did.
♪ ♪
Good work, Loba. Thanks for giving me a bath.
♪ ♪
- All right. It's time to see
if this thing is gonna sink or swim, right?
This is not easy to launch.
[grunts]
[exhales]
There it is, floating.
Now the big question is, will it float with my ass on it?
Don't forget that I bypassed my right to use the tarp.
Talking big about it now,
but hopefully, I won't come back wet.
Guess it's now or never, right?
Hopefully, I won't fall in.
♪ ♪
Uh-oh. [bleep]
♪ ♪
I need to have my weight more dispersed.
More dispersed meaning right in the middle.
♪ ♪
It's all right.
♪ ♪
Definitely sits lower than I'd like it to be,
but it's all good.
Travel 100 feet in the water.
Done.
It's no ocean liner,
but it keeps me afloat.
[beachy music]
Yeah, I earned this guy.
♪ ♪
[sighs]
[dramatic music]
- Today is my test day.
And I'm very excited.
So before I even let my boat go,
I have to get the outrigger on.
♪ ♪
Literally don't know how to enter this boat.
♪ ♪
OK. Whew.
We're in.
♪ ♪
The outrigger works.
OK. I'm comfortable.
I'm not impressed with my paddles at all.
[laughing]
OK, I'm ditching the paddle,
and I'm going hand-powered.
Here we go, 100 feet successfully.
It did not leak.
Coming to dock.
I just want to remind you, Lucas,
that this isn't a competition about paddles.
It's a competition about boats.
I also have a broken toe-ish.
Working with a broken toe, making a boat--
it's a whole thing.
♪ ♪
- [exhales] All right, maiden voyage.
♪ ♪
All right, so I don't see any obvious leaks.
I'm excited to get in this thing and see how it does.
♪ ♪
Pretty stable for a tarp.
♪ ♪
I am super stoked about this kayak.
It's 100% waterproof.
It's super light.
The thing I really like about it is it's very stable.
I mean, I can lean over, put my weight to one side
without feeling like I'm gonna tip over.
♪ ♪
The only thing I don't like about this
is that the tarp itself--it's a very, very delicate tarp.
If you came up on any rocks or logs or anything like that,
you'd have to be very careful to avoid those things.
The requirements for this challenge were
to paddle at least 100 feet
and for there not be any leaks.
I think we have smashed that.
♪ ♪
See y'all on the other side of the lake.
♪ ♪
- Three days ago, I gave Britt, Callie, and Clay a challenge.
And that was to build a wilderness watercraft.
Let's take a look at Britt's watercraft.
He did something really refreshing and different.
He used completely local materials--
his bamboo that he found-- and not using the tarp at all,
that's definitely a bonus point that I'm gonna give Britt here.
He chose not to make a paddle. He used a pole,
which is totally typical for raft users.
Another clever idea for Britt.
However, he did get wet on his raft,
and that could spell for danger while being out on the water.
Let's talk about Clay's kayak.
The connections, the joints, all looked super well tied.
We see Clay also using fire to shape his frame,
and I think that's very smart.
- [grunts]
- Clay's kayak travels so smooth.
You can just see, he's tipping side to side.
Incredibly stable.
All right, so let's take a look at Callie's kayak.
The boat frame is sound, lashed together well.
She's using an outrigger.
It looks like it actually makes
the whole process quite stable.
However, her paddle was a disappointment for her.
It didn't work that well.
And she had to paddle home using her hands.
So all three challengers have met the criteria,
more or less successfully.
It's now time to announce the winner.
It's incredibly tough to pick
amongst all these talented people.
Remember, I'm picking not just on the three criteria,
but their process along the way.
♪ ♪
So without much further ado,
this week's winner is...
♪ ♪
Clay Hayes.
He did an incredible job checking off all three boxes.
It was just expert-level craftsmanship.
And Clay, congratulations.
- So this was a fun one.
I really enjoyed the watercraft build.
And I really enjoyed seeing
what everybody else came up with.
So thank you, Lucas.
And thanks, everybody else, for your hard work.
♪ ♪