Wow.
I've been dropped off alone on the west coast of Tasmania.
This is going to be so good and so bad, probably at the same time.
There goes humanity.
If you don't start getting food in quick,
you're not going to last long out here.
Oh, this moss feels amazing!
My goal is to be the first grandmother, mother to win this.
(CRACK!) That was a tree falling.
Oh, here comes the rain.
See how this shelter holds up.
This is stupid. This is ridiculous.
I've got no chance of recovering that fire,
which means I can't stay warm.
MAN: We're halfway to the South Pole.
We're going to be totally alone.
WOMAN: It's Tasmania. It's cold. It's rain. It's snow.
WOMAN: We're all going to leave changed forever.
WOMAN: Holy fuck. What is this place?
MAN: What have I gotten myself into?
YEAH!
MAN: We have to document this whole experience
while trying to survive at the same time.
(CHUCKLES) Check it out.
Like 60 K winds. (WIND HOWLS)
MAN: Mother Nature's kicking my arse.
(GRUNTS, GROANS)
MAN: This experience is just as much a mind game
as it is a survival game.
(LAUGHS) We got dinner!
Argh, you fucker!
Yum!
I'm suddenly going downhill, very, very fast.
Whoa!
Oh, my heart!
WOMAN: A $250,000 prize would change my life.
I like you, Tasmania!
Ohh!
Ah.
Got up this morning, had a dingo's breakfast.
For those of you that don't know what a dingo's breakfast is,
that's a drink of water and a look around.
And...
..and everything's just so wet, eh?
(SNIFFLES) Oh, it was cold last night.
It was freezing.
(KOOKABURRAS LAUGH) Do you hear those kookaburras?
They're laughing at me because I'm just thinking about tapping.
(KOOKABURRAS LAUGH)
When I first thought of coming out here,
it was more to, um...just have something that, um...
..that my daughter could look back on
and, um...just...
'Cause I don't want to sit there under that shelter, you know,
night after night just being miserable
when I could be at home with her, giving her a cuddle, you know?
I had a one in ten shot at getting us a lot of money.
but that's not why I come here.
I just come here because I wanted her to be proud, hey, Mum.
That's all.
(SNIFFLES)
(KISSES)
This is Rob.
I'm officially tapping out.
The palawa, when they were out here,
they would move seasonally to where conditions were more hospitable.
Everything's just constantly wet.
You wouldn't have lived with any joy here.
I hope I did them proud.
I would have liked to have stayed longer but, um...
And, you know, and it's not lost on me
that chances like this don't come along very often and...
Yeah. It's something I would have liked to have done better at for them.
The funny thing is that survivalist mindset, what it does,
it automatically positions country as the enemy -
something to fight against and something to resist.
The last person standing is ultimately the person
who can resist what country is telling them the longest, you know,
so, who's the...
We have a word 'nanya' - that means 'stubborn', you know?
So, who the most stubborn person...
..who wants to sit out there cold, wet and miserable the longest,
congratulations - you win, you know?
It's kind of... it's just counterintuitive.
It's just... it's the complete opposite
to, you know, what would have been done back in the day.
I think this experience just reinforced the value of family.
They always say that absence makes the heart grow fonder, you know,
and I definitely felt them.
Felt them with me while I was out there,
but also felt them calling me home.
GINA: Already this place feels like...
..like it's where I'm going to be.
Oh, that sun.
Today I nut out my permanent shelter.
Get the frame up.
The west coast of Tasmania is cold, it's rugged, it's wet, it's rainy.
Shelter's the number one thing.
Number one priority in survival.
I want to have a home.
You know? I want to have somewhere that feels like it's mine.
I need to get to work.
(GROANS, LAUGHS)
I'm so fat.
(LAUGHS)
I'm so fat I can't stand up.
I have to...I have to rock.
(LAUGHS)
I have to rock.
Oh, mind you, these boots don't help.
OK. One, two, three. Up!
There we go.
(LAUGHS)
Oh, my God, that's embarrassing.
In preparation for this, I've been putting on weight.
That fat is going to be my survival strategy.
In a survival situation,
fat becomes the most important nutritional component.
Without fat, you can have as much protein and greens as you need
and you will still starve.
So, this is my primary focus for the next probably two weeks.
Expend the bulk of my calories getting a shelter done.
I have enough food on my body
that I don't have to worry about starving any time soon.
Scoping out where the best place for a shelter is going to be.
It's going to be somewhere on this little promontory.
Surviving in Australia is harder than you'd think.
Not only are there all sorts of dangerous critters
that, you know, if they bite you can cause considerable harm,
the gum trees are basically throwing limbs down at you,
so even the trees are trying to kill you.
There's a big old myrtle back there.
You can see that could conceivably chuck a branch down.
That's going to fall straight down...
..there. Ka-chunk.
We have incredibly extreme weather.
We will have wind that can be up to 120, 130 kilometres an hour,
and then trees will fall in the forests.
Imagine that falling on you at two in the morning.
It can be really challenging to find somewhere safe to be.
May not look like much now. Give me a few days.
That is going to be a home.
Ah, beauty.
It's full of water.
That's my drinking water sorted for the day.
Awesome.
Mm. Mmm.
That's good drink water.
I keep putting my axe down and then having a hard time seeing it again
because it's so camouflaged, because it's wood coloured.
So I'm going to tie a rag onto it
or some bright paracord
to make it easier to see.
I reckon there's a very good chance I could last out here forever.
I'm very experienced in this area.
I've done it many times and I know what to expect.
I'm a former army helicopter pilot, air force aeroplane pilot
and survival instructor.
Being a pilot in the military teaches you to prepare.
I have a lot of experience all around Australia
in a whole bunch of different environments,
and now just leaving the air force,
I make adventure films about survival.
Yes! I got a fish!
I'm strong at building things with my hands
and I'm good at bush tucker.
I'm good at hunting.
Well, I certainly have a drive
because I'm competitive, like most people, to win,
and obviously the money would be helpful for my family as well.
Who's going to miss me the most?
I think the dog's going to miss him. What do you think, Ollie?
My family is used to me being away.
They don't like it, and I don't like being away from them,
but the disadvantages of me being away
are outweighed by the advantages.
When you throw yourself 100% at something,
you don't really have any regrets afterwards.
I'm good at prioritising what I do
because there's so many things that you have to do,
and the order in which you do them
can mean the difference between success and failure.
My strategy is to prioritise food above all else.
I really haven't improved camp much and I don't think I will.
Shelter building in Australia
is not as important as it is in the arctic of North America
because you don't need to survive an Arctic winter.
This shelter would be fine for 100 days.
And even a fireplace. Like, I don't need a fireplace at the moment.
I don't need to cook anything.
Having a fire's a little bit like having a baby -
you've got to look after it.
If I don't need it, there's no point wasting your energy
to dig a fire pit and get a fire going.
So...yeah, I see no rush for that.
The difference between winning this or not
is whether you can bring in food.
I reckon that's the whole game.
So I got myself in a bit of a funk, and it's only day two.
It is really wet.
It rained overnight.
When I woke up, fire was out. I made a mistake.
I should have put my fire under my shelter.
But I was scared of burning and melting my tarp.
I knew the first couple of days would be tough.
So I'll ride through it.
But it is super dark in here, which isn't helping,
and thick.
And it's just not comfortable.
It's like something's been gnawing on this bit of wood here...
..in the night.
I don't remember that one looking like that.
Yeah, it's just weird.
I want to move my spot.
Find somewhere that is a bit more open.
Let's go for a bit of a walk, hey?
My strategy is to get a sense of the lay of the land
before I set up a long-term shelter.
(THUMP!)
And then get to work on how I'm going to catch my food.
Just gonna suss out this little spot that I found yesterday.
Up in through here.
Ooh! This is going to be a prick having to carry my stuff
if I find something good.
It's a bit challenging.
But it's very dense.
(SIGHS)
(LOUD RUSTLING)
I don't know what that was.
(GROANS) On my bum.
Down there.
(CHUCKLES) I nearly slid down there.
I don't really want to be too far away from the water.
But...that's so steep.
That's bullshit.
So, I'm not even going to worry about that.
It's not worth breaking my neck.
So, potter back through here.
I don't want to go back in there.
It's so dark.
Oh, yeah, gotta check to get this fire going a bit better.
It's not great.
Well, it's day two.
First night I stayed here
and the shelter's actually held up pretty well.
I'm surprised and very happy with that,
because I was getting a little worried.
(COUGHS)
I need to get more wood for that fire.
That's the first thing I'll do.
It just feels unreal being this competition.
I never really expected to get this far when I put the application in.
It's just crazy, I think.
I'm not really here to prove anything.
I'm just here to challenge myself, really.
I don't feel like I have anything to prove.
Getting kind of hungry.
(COUGHS)
I've been so excited about fishing here.
Just this whole lead-up,
all I can think about is I really want to catch a big fish,
or even a big eel.
One of those.
I just want to make the most of it and just get an experience.
Hello, guys.
Delicious. (GRUNTS)
It's going to be nice not having to feed pigs when I'm gone, actually.
I'm 22 and I'm a country boy.
I probably like to spend most of my time by myself outdoors.
I just sort of always wanted to just be able to live off the land,
as long as I can remember.
I have a lot of experience in trapping, a lot of bushcraft.
I can build all sorts of things
and problem solving and fixing things.
I think personally that's one of my biggest skills
is just to assess the situation
and work out what you need to get through it.
What did you say the other day -
Jimmy lit his first fire when he was like two or something?
It was before... like, when he could walk.
Yeah. Yeah.
I reckon I've got mostly my parents to thank for my survival knowledge.
Ever since I was really little,
they've been teaching me a whole range of outdoor activities.
Hunting and fishing and camping.
Well, I think possibly being one of the youngest people on here,
it could be an advantage.
I don't have kids or a partner or, like, a family of my own.
I'm kind of wild and free, really.
(CHUCKLES) I can go as long as I want.
I don't have people that really rely on me.
Sort of looking forward to being alone, huh.
Bye! Bye!
I just don't feel good. (COUGHS)
I don't even know what temperature I am.
I feel weird.
Hot, cold, hot, cold.
I'm fine with hard work and stuff,
but when I don't have food, I struggle.
I just want to go fishing.
Now I got to go all that way.
All that way to the fishing spot.
And try not to die. (CHUCKLES)
Try not to slip down the sides in all that mud.
Oh!
It's hard 'cause my boots have mud all over them now.
This is a very harsh environment.
It's not going to be very easy to live in.
It's cool, this place, though.
Like, even though it's hard to trek through, it's...
I don't really get to go into any rainforests.
Whoa. Slippery there.
Whoa!
Oh, man.
Whoa.
Just nice and slowly.
Oh, my pants are full of mud.
I'm just so dizzy.
Oh, man. I can feel I'm not thinking straight.
Just put it right there.
Just try to take it slowly.
Getting so exhausted so easily.
I was planning on doing a lot of meditation out here,
although I've found every time I stop and just look...
..that it's like an instant meditative state.
Just enough to not hear my own thoughts and...
There's... (LAUGHS) There's bubbles.
There's definitely bubbles.
Here. Check this out.
That's not rain.
Man, what if it's a crayfish?
Come on, little crayfish.
Alright, cool. Let's get a fishing rod.
I wonder when I'm going to crack,
when I'm gonna start to...start to crack due to the starvation.
Probably won't be too long.
A few days, maybe.
You know, if I don't have any luck getting fish.
You know, just having that button there, I could just press it
and go, "Nup, come get me.
"I'm going to the pub. I'm going to get a steak."
(CHUCKLES)
So we need... we need to get some fish.
Basically, going to do something real simple.
So I'm just going to clean up the tip of this stick here.
Just get that outer bark off.
And I'm basically just gonna chuck some line on that,
tie it off and then go down and dangle it over.
I just want to get it right in the water.
Ahh! Righto.
Righto, little buggy bug.
Found this poor little cricket.
I think it's a cricket.
There's a few of them around here,
so they're going to be on the diet.
(CHUCKLES) I'm fishing!
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
(WHISTLES)
Wow. Tassie sun. That's awesome!
(LAUGHS) Yes! How good's this?
Far out, that's beautiful.
Thank you!
Not many nibbles.
What if I just can't catch fish or can't catch anything?
I can stay here forever.
Everything's good.
I'm not lonely.
I love everything about this place. Every single thing.
Except not having food in me tummy.
Have I got mud on my face?
Doesn't bother me if I do.
Day two.
It was raining all night last night.
It didn't stop raining at all.
It's pretty shit.
There was even a leak in my tarp where it was coming through.
I set up my tarp wrong on the first night.
That was my mistake. That was stupid.
It rains 255 out of 365 days a year here.
This is not a good start at all.
(SIGHS) My clothes are soaked.
(GROANS)
My waterproof jacket is soaked.
My sleeping bag cover is soaked.
The bottom of my bag is full of water.
Everything is wet.
My gloves, my socks, my gaiters.
Absolutely soaked.
The pants.
I'm in a lot of trouble.
Fucking stupid, man.
(SIGHS)
You get wet, you get cold, you get hypothermia,
you're out of the game.
If I'm going to make this happen, I got to really, really step it up.
I'm going to start again.
Day two. Let's do it.
So I'm just making... getting some stuff ready
so I can make a fire...
..to boil up some water.
I'm pretty thirsty.
I mean, I've got some there, but it looks super funky.
I'm sitting in overnight.
It's just so wet.
This stuff is so wet.
Come on.
(SIGHS) Fuck. Psych!
Stop.
This is shit.
I need to walk away.
Fire I can get right.
Never had an issue.
I can't do it.
How do I survive this if I can't get fire?
If you don't have fire, you can't boil your water,
and if I can't boil my water, I can't drink.
(SIGHS) Try again.
Ohh... Come on! Far out.
Yes.
You sonofabitch.
Simple things, right?
Simple things.
That's doing my head in the most.
This is probably the stupidest thing
that I think I've ever put my hand up to do.
Train and I, we've been together 18 going on 19 years this year.
We've built the life that we want.
There's not one part of it that I hate.
(SNIFFLES)
I don't need to do this to prove to anyone that I'm a strong woman.
(SNIFFLES)
(BEEPING)
It's Beck.
(TEARFULLY) I want to go home.
I...I want to go home.
I'm tapping out.
I haven't had a decent drink of water today
because I haven't been able to b... I haven't been able to start a fire.
I'm pretty confident with the fire and the ferro rod
but, um, have a look at that.
I have worn that down so much just trying to get something...
..trying to get tinder to light.
And so if I was to stay here any longer, I wouldn't have fire.
I have a good life, I have a happy life
and I want to go back to that life.
I don't need to be out here to think about that or soul search.
I don't need to do that. I've got a good life.
This is a super tough environment.
I think it's a mental game.
Completely mental.
My hat goes off to the rest of the people that are left here.
If they're having a go at this, they're tough. They've got grit.
I've got grit, just in other ways.
VOICEOVER: Alone Australia is brought to you by Kia.
Experience the ultimate human endurance
as 10 contestants battle to survive alone in the Tasmanian wilderness,
with the winner taking home a prize worth $250,000.
Cam. Cam!
Whoo. Whoo. Whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo, whoo.
My goodness, it's disco. Stereo.
Eugh. Well, that made me dizzy.
(MAGPIES CAROL)
I think I've made the choice of where my shelter will be,
so I'm going to need some poles.
OK, my friend.
How do you feel about being part of my shelter?
What do you reckon?
Getting set up for survival is always a massive calorie burn.
Alright. I have my first tripod.
I've been training for something like this my whole life.
I've been working on the physical skills
of shelter, water, fire and food,
but also the internal skills
of resilience, problem solving and creativity.
Alright. That's it. Shoes are coming off.
I'm sorry, feet. You've done really well, but... (INHALES SHARPLY)
Ouchie.
Ow, ow, ow.
Alright, enough.
I'm feeling the push and the pressure of time to get myself set up.
I'm feeling the pressure of the elements.
Hyah! Let's get you up.
But putting that energy in it means that I'll then have a home
for the rest of my time here.
That goes there.
And I'll have another tripod...here.
Yeah.
That'll do.
It's extremely muddy here,
particularly when you get down to the water's edge.
What I'm trying to do is find a log like this one that's under water
and it will...hopefully when I pull it out
have lots of things I can use for bait.
This is kind of what I'm talking about,
this tiny little...
..bug there.
Trout love these kinds of things.
My biggest concern is the food.
I have a fast metabolism and if I don't get it, I'll be gone.
So I'd like to go fishing. There's a little mayfly.
But, I mean, this place is an absolute bastard of a place to fish.
It is so snaggy that if I set a certain line,
I'm just going to lose my hook.
So I'm going to start making a kayak.
The kayak is going to solve my set line fishing needs,
my ability to put out a gillnet when I make one,
allow me to find water and do my recce.
So, this kayak is actually pivotal to my survival out here.
So, each one of these hoops
is going to be like a bulkhead in my kayak.
This will be a small one close to the front,
and then I'll have a bigger one near my feet and my hips.
I had to build a canoe for the last solo adventure.
So I can apply that here.
As you get older, you just keep getting better
because you've had more time to gather skills.
These are techniques which are really going to help you survive.
(CROW CAWS)
I like crows. They're funny buggers.
(CROW CAWS)
I remember reading about what it means.
I think one 'raak' is yes.
Two 'raak-raak' is no.
(CROW CAWS THREE TIMES)
I'm feeling good about this kayak. I can't wait to start fishing.
What I'm after is to see if I can reach self-sustainment
in the bush.
So, if I can do that
and I can comfortably live for as long as I want to live for here,
I could definitely win.
Let's go for a walk, see what we can find.
I need to see what I'm working with here.
Suss out the land.
We'll see if there's anything worth trapping
and set some traps up.
I'm a hunter. I do guided hunts.
I track and stalk things for a living.
I'm normally out in the bush every week, tracking game.
By looking at the signs,
I know whatever's in this area.
I did a lot of tracks through here yesterday.
And then what I'm doing today is I'm walking back over them
to see if there's any animal tracks that have stepped over mine
from yesterday,
to see what's come through.
I've seen a couple of footprints in the mud.
I don't want to get my scent everywhere in the area here.
I'm a meat eater.
That's all I do. I eat meat.
I'm hoping if I go to the higher ground,
I want to see, like, a beautiful, you know, grass pasture
with just animals everywhere.
Not even a game trail.
Just quiet and nothing.
What are we going to do?
If I don't find what I'm looking for and I got nothing to work with,
I'm in a lot of trouble.
I don't want to be starving.
I don't know what's going to happen.
Something better fucking change.
I just wish I didn't feel sick.
I'll do a RAT.
I don't have any table or anything for this,
so hopefully I don't tip anything over here.
But...I don't know.
Oh!
(COUGHS)
Oh, man.
I mean, I'm sure I'd survive out here with COVID.
Isolating pretty well. (CHUCKLES)
It's just...
I don't know, people get COVID and they struggle
even when they have a lot of food and water and stuff.
If that comes up positive...
Oh, man.
VOICEOVER: Alone Australia is brought to you by Kia.
Experience the ultimate human endurance
as 10 contestants battle to survive alone in the Tasmanian wilderness,
with the winner taking home a prize worth $250,000.
Oh, man.
Yeah, it's got a line there.
Better let them know.
Of all the times to get COVID.
Oh, man. Was just getting started.
Hey, Jimmy. How are you feeling?
Oh, just sort of sharp pains on my left side.
Just sort of about the bottom lower rib.
Listen to your heart, mate, if you... Yeah.
There you go.
And if you can just take an arm out, I'll do your blood pressure.
I'll take this...
Your heart's really racing along.
It's...it's sitting on about 120 to 130.
Yeah, right. And now, for a fit young bloke like yourself,
that should be down more like maybe 60 or 70.
So your heart's going almost double what I'd expect it to be.
Yeah. Oh.
And I think the COVID's irritating your heart
and that's causing it to race. Yeah.
Probably worried enough to say
I need to medically take you out of the field.
Oh, man.
Fuck.
It'd be pretty tough out here doing this competition without being sick
but I think being sick just puts a whole new level into it.
I came out here to test myself,
but I'm not out here for coming first if it means I'm going to kill myself.
I'm still young. I got a lot of my life to live.
I'm not going to risk doing permanent damage to myself.
PETER: It is pitch black outside.
Like, pitch black.
I can't find my head torch, eh.
And this is really bothering me because I need it.
I don't want to spend the night here without the fucking head torch.
My wife fucking told me -
"Keep your shit organised. Keep your shit organised."
Come on.
The last thing you want to do here is spend the night without a head torch.
Come on, man.
Got to get your shit together, mate.
Gotta get your fucking shit together.
It's bad enough you got all your fucking warm clothes wet
and all your waterproof shit wet.
Oh.
Yes!
(KISSES)
Whew.
That was close.
It's shit like that,
just, like, a simple thing like that...
..that could mean your ticket home.
(SIGHS) Alright.
Even sitting here at night in the black,
all you can hear the pitter-patter of the rain on the tarp.
There is not a single animal noise out there.
Not a single animal noise. Not one.
So, for dinner tonight, we are having water.
That's all we're having tonight. Just a bottle of water.
I have not seen a single thing alive.
Surviving here is going to be very hard.
I haven't eaten in three and a bit days.
Come on. Give me something.
If we don't get meat, we're probably not gonna do too well out here.
This may take me to a level of starvation
that I've never experienced before.
Ooh! Just caught an eel, I think.
Yeah, baby!
And I've already found a few little grubs.
Eugh. (SPITS)
This is really getting on my nerves.
I feel like I've let myself down a bit.
It's very easy for the mind to go,
"Oh, you can just go home and eat."
(PHONE RINGS) WOMAN: Hello?
Captions by Red Bee Media (c) SBS Australia 2023