Before I explain why I would subject myself to the hardest adventure I have ever experienced in my life, I’d better explain what Survivor is. Survivor is a reality TV show that started in the United States in 2000. It’s now up to season 40 in the US, while the Australian version is only on Season 4. I bring up this point because the American version is only 39 days long, while the Aussie version is 50 days … 50 days! (You can make up your own mind as to which is more gruelling to film and who are the tougher competitors.)

There is no question that this show is a reality show, but the producers think of it as more of a documentary style. So there is very little ‘producing’: there are no retakes, no-one gives you lines to do, they simply film you 24/7. The premise is splitting 24 somewhat random people (who have never met), all with various pedigrees, skill sets, ages and talents, into two ‘tribes’ of 12 and dumping them on an island (in Fiji, in my season) to compete with each other for food and overall survival. The last person not voted off the island wins $500 000. Besides the chance to win the money, it sounds insane — I realise that. Did I mention you only get a few items of clothing, the food you eat is only what you can catch or win, and there are no beds, bathrooms, toothbrushes or shelter of any kind? The camera crew (who are everywhere all the time, 24/7) never offer you a secret hamburger, or stick of gum, or even a wink or a smile.

You battle every day for either a reward or for immunity (not the inoculation kind). The winning tribe of a reward challenge benefits from the rewards, which are either food, necessity or comfort — think a fishing net, knife, chocolate bar or flint. When a tribe loses an immunity challenge they go to ‘Tribal Council’. This is where you get mentally abused as your fellow losers decide which of you gets thrown off the island and sent home. Now at this point you’re probably thinking ‘home’ is not such a bad place, and you’d be begging ‘please pick me’ — but after starving and fighting to win challenges every day, something inside each of these 24 competitors says ‘you must win, you must survive’. Whether this desire to subject yourself to the above for 50 days and nights is the true ‘Aussie competitive spirit’ or insanity, I have yet to decipher. With all of that said … why on God’s beautiful green earth would anyone want to be physically or mentally abused like this? So WHY?

The ‘why’ for each of the Survivor competitors is unique. I could never begin to suggest their individual reasons for competing, even though I have gotten to know most of them very intimately. The reason I agreed to be on the Champions tribe for Season 4 all started in January 2019 at a ‘New Year’s goal-setting’ breakfast. I hold this annually with a few girlfriends, Andi, Sarah and Susie, at my beach house. I know … ‘goal-setting brekkie’?
I may have already answered the ‘why’ here.

Every year my beautiful friends and I create five personal goals and five professional goals that we want to accomplish within the year. My goals were pretty interesting for 2019. Retail Zoo was mature and we had an effective CEO so I was moving more into a mentor role than a day-to-day one. I had spent the last 20 years running like a madwoman to get things done; it felt like a real change-of-life goal-setting opportunity. My goals were:

1. Meet some new people (I am a bit of a hermit).
2. Do something that scares me. (The older you get the more cautious you become. For example: I love to surf — but the surf I go in has smaller waves. I love to ride a horse — but now I just trot. When I’m on a rollercoaster all I can think of is, ‘When was it last maintained?’)
3. Lose some kilos (we always have a rip-roaring summer thus resulting in three to five kilos being put on).
4. Get out of my comfort zone. (I have a nice routine, which works beautifully for me, but I needed to shake it up a bit.)
5. Try something new. (I was feeling I was in a bit of a rut, so I felt like I was ready.)

In writing this, I can sense a pattern here: ‘new’, ‘scary’, ‘comfort zone’, ‘get out of routine’. What I did not realise was the Survivor gods were listening as well. Not long after I had set these goals, the producer of Survivor Australia called and asked if I would participate. I felt physically sick, as deep down, I knew I could not say no.

After hanging up, I immediately thought, ‘As if I can take two months out of my life to go play Survivor !’ Lack of time is pretty much everyone’s excuse to not do something — but never a good one. I spoke to Jeff and Tahlia (my 10 year old) and said, ‘I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that I may have to go away for 10 weeks.’ Tahlia’s face dropped. ‘No way are you going.’ She then asked, ‘What for?’ I explained my phone call and Tahlia jumped off her chair, threw herself into my arms and said ‘You said YES right?’ Tahlia is a massive Survivor fan (having watched every season of Survivor Australia ) and could not think of anything she would rather see me on.

I had honestly thought my family would be saying ‘Absolutely not, how can we live without you for 10 weeks?’ The image I had of my role in this family was so off I had to laugh at myself. With complete family support (from Jeff, Samuel, Oliver, Riley and Tahlia) there was only one person left to convince: me.

I have a super-soft bed. In fact, choosing a bed is one of my superpowers. I get the perfect mattress, pillows and sheets all designed for the consummate night’s sleep. I have a seriously gorgeous-looking husband, kids that I really like to spend time with, beautiful friends and an interesting, diverse life. Why give this up to sleep in the elements, with no 1000-thread-count sheets (or even a bed for that matter), to spoon complete strangers for warmth — strangers who will no doubt smell bad and eventually turn on me? The answer is simple … life is there to be lived!

When starting Boost, we wanted a positioning line (a phrase that would encapsulate our vision) and I kept coming back to my ‘Love Life’ motto. I wanted to create a business that could help me achieve my ‘love of life’ as well as helping staff and customers to do the same. ‘Love Life’ for me was creating a business that could give me the freedom to work the way I wanted to work. It was creating a store, product and staff that could help customers feel that little bit better, with a great-tasting product and real ingredients in a cool environment, all served with a smile. I saw this decision to do Survivor as an extension of this motto.

I had worked with the production house Endemol Shine, the producers of Survivor , while on the TV show Shark Tank for the previous four years. They are a great professional production house, so I knew that I would be in good hands. I also knew that there was not going to be any special treatment (damn) as they take their role of creating strong shows very seriously.

The timing for Survivor , however, could not have been worse. Two businesses that were looking at major changes needed significant input from me. I also sat on the board of directors of a separate business that was having major strategy meetings that I could not miss at the time and our house (that I had been building for 18 months) was in its final stages of completion. But how can one say no to this chance-of-a-lifetime opportunity to really see what you’re made of?

My agreeing to be on Survivor was based out of fear. I’m not going to lie — fear was what drove me when starting a business all those years ago, and it is a great motivator for being prepared. Yes, I am highly competitive and usually in decent physical shape but, admittedly, I’d become softer as I’d gotten older. I kept questioning if I had lost my winning edge with this soft life of mine. The next few days and weeks would tell me.

Filming started in April 2019, but before the competitors left we had to do every physical test known to man to ensure we were not going to die of a heart attack or other unknown illnesses while filming. We had to do a fitness test, blood test, heart test and even a psychological test, all of which I passed with flying colours … whew.

I truly believe that, if you know in your heart of hearts that you have done as much preparation as possible, if you fail you will have no regrets. My prep started by watching every immunity challenge that I could find on YouTube. I then discovered TEN All Access, which had every Survivor series from the start, so I devoured over 100 hours of Survivor over the next few weeks. (I am not sure this really helped or made me more fearful.) What I concluded after bingeing previous Survivor episodes was that you have to be humble, nice, strong and extremely lucky to NOT get voted out. I’d also observed that when players are the most comfortable is probably when they’re going to be voted out.

Additional prep included hours of internet research. One American contestant mentioned a puzzle app that she used; seconds later I was practising a slide puzzle to try and get my brain into puzzle mode. I met with a body and mind expert, Paul Taylor, who discussed techniques and coping skills to get through the mentally harder times and the physical challenges. I increased my fitness regimen and really reviewed my diet, practising a daily 16-hour fast so that my body was good with no food for longer periods of time. I even arrived in Fiji 24 hours earlier and met with a native Fijian who showed me basic techniques on how to find food, build a fire and build a shelter. At this point I didn’t look back on what more I could have done to prepare. Upon arriving at Nadi Airport I felt as confident as I possibly could to start Survivor . The reality, which I learned on day one of Survivor , was that no amount of preparation could have been enough for the experience I was about to have.

What have I gotten myself into?

I know if you’re a sceptic you think that a lot of it is for show: surely there’s a toilet and shower somewhere, perhaps a Mars bar hidden in a tree? Maybe some reality shows are a bit fake, but not Survivor . They take the documentary aspect of this production very seriously.

I arrived at a little resort called Daku Resort, which looked like it was straight out of the 80s. It definitely needed some love. I met my chaperone (who was there to make sure that I did not speak to any other contestants) and with a smile she collected my phone, wallet and passport. I was thinking, ‘I guess I can’t change my mind at the last minute and do a runner!’ For someone like me, who loves to be in control, it was a strange feeling to hand over contact to the outside world. In a strange way, it was quite liberating. I always have the need to be connected: I get back to people quickly, I make decisions even quicker and I am a machine with the amount of work I can get through. When I work, I have my computer, iPad and phone all around me so that I can multitask — so indeed it was a forced liberation.

After giving up any connection I had to family, work and friends, I was taken to my room and given the house rules. I could not leave my room, talk to anyone other than the chaperone (lucky she was nice) and I had to wait, twiddling my thumbs. The production team really did keep us in suspense as we had no idea how many days we were going to be waiting like this for the game to begin. The room was dodgy, the air conditioner only worked sometimes and the food was average, but I was excited for this adventure. I read books, wrote in a diary and tried to enjoy the solitude.

After three days of this my chaperone finally came and got me and said that we were going to shoot the opening scene. I was loaded onto a bus with three other people: Abbey Holmes (the AFLW footballer), Ross Clarke-Jones (the big wave surfer) and Pia Miranda (the actress). We weren’t allowed to speak to each other, and I had no idea at the time that these people would end up being critical to my game and become long-term friends.

We rocked up to a swiftly flowing river and were told to jump in, fully dressed, and walk and swim down the river. And ‘for God’s sake, whatever you do, do not drink the water.’ For me that advice lasted five minutes, as I fell in and gulped a massive mouthful of polluted water. I hoped my immune system was up for some serious overtime work. This was the first time that we saw the other contestants: I knew of Steve Bradbury, but really no-one else. We were still not allowed to talk to each other, which is so strange as you feel incredibly rude by not introducing yourself or simply being polite. Welcome to Survivor . After walking and swimming up and down the river we were taken back to our rooms to once again wait for the game to begin.

Twenty-four hours later the game was on. Once again we got onto our bus and were told not to talk to each other. Abbey, Pia, Rosco and I simply gave each other polite smiles. We were allowed only what we were wearing and that had to be vetted by the producers to make sure nothing was waterproof (as it’s important that we really suffer). Finally, off we went. We were escorted to the beach with the eight other people who made up the Champions Tribe. Some I recognised but most I didn’t (I really don’t get out much).

The strange thing wasn’t how surreal it all was; it was the stranger sensation of thinking about all the things I had to tell people back home, but having no way of doing so. This forced digital detox was exactly what I needed.

The first day

From the beach we were immediately escorted to our first challenge. Nothing like getting the game going quickly. I stood with my new frenemies and found out what was in store. My nerves were at an all-time high and my mind was racing, ‘What if I embarrass myself and fail the first time up?’ My daughter would be mortified!

The challenge appeared simple: there was a sand bag in the middle of an enclosed sand ring. Starting at the edge, facing a competitor from the opposite team, you simply had to be the first one to get the sandbag, bring it back to your side of the circle and drop it in a marked square. How hard can that be, right? Well, we found out quickly that it is super hard and the Contenders Tribe had something to prove.

TV viewers saw it as first to three, but when we played it was first to six. The producers, we later learned, would need to edit most challenges for ‘TV time’. One by one we squared off. Pia, who I found out later was a famous Australian actress, is a small-framed woman of five-foot-two. She competed against a 40-something woman named Sarah Ayles, a tsunami survivor. She was a solid, strong-looking woman who was about 13 centimetres taller than Pia. Pia is tough as guts (as I would soon learn), but unfortunately she did not have weight on her side and found herself squashed by this woman, who was yelling in her ear ‘I need this, I am winning’, which she did.

When each team had five wins I was up for the decider. No pressure , I thought sarcastically, while seriously worried about my first impression. Through sheer determination I dragged the Contender, Casey Hawkins, and the sandbag to my square. I felt I was off to a good start and was (hopefully) looking good for my new tribe. One thing everyone knows on Survivor is you need fire for warmth and cooking or your life is miserable. Thankfully we received a reward of food and flint for our first fire at camp.

After the challenge my team returned to our beach and were finally able to properly meet each other. There were faces that I knew and others that I did not. I had recently seen Ross Clarke-Jones’s doco, Storm Surfers . Having seen the doco I was surprised that Ross was even alive, let alone on Survivor ! There was ET Ettingshausen, the NRL champion, whom I did not recognise. (Being from Melbourne, if you are not AFL then you do not exist in sport.) There was a beautiful blonde who I recognised: Abbey, an AFLW footballer. Others included Steve Bradbury, who we all know as the ‘last man standing’; the extremely well-known and respected Nova Peris, who is an ex-Olympian; and an exceptionally happy-looking woman who I discovered was Pia Miranda, who had starred in the movie Looking for Alibrandi . Simon Black, an amazing AFL football player, was in our tribe, along with Susie Maroney, who set ridiculous records in long-distance swimming. Luke Toki I recognised from Season 2 of Survivor . Anastasia Woolmer I did not recognise, but later found out was a memory champion. Last but not least was David Genat, a supermodel, who on day one looked quite intimidating. These 11 people were going to be either my best friends or my worst enemies over the next few weeks.

After a few uncomfortable hugs we got onto the matter at hand: building a shelter. It was getting late in the afternoon and the sun set at about 6.30 pm, so we did not have much time. ET and Blacky (Simon Black) took control and started building the shelter while others worked on the fire and food. Nova was self-designated cook (you do not mess with Nova and her cooking) and the rest of us were worker bees. After a lot of hard effort the shelter was done; we were about half a metre off the ground, with a bamboo floor and a decent roof, and were pretty chuffed with ourselves. The fire was going and the rice and beans were in the pot; life was looking okay.

We then got down to the business of getting to know everyone. After this initial ‘who’s who in the zoo’ it was getting late and we started to think about bed. (I use the term ‘bed’ loosely as it was more like dirt and sand with lots of bugs.) Abbey and I quickly realised we had something in common: we loved to go to bed early, so we hit the sack.

Now, this is where Survivor started to feel real. We laid down on the hard, round and ridiculously uncomfortable bamboo. I found a spot that was at least not painful and started to rest — (to call it sleep would be a stretch). Slowly, one by one, the tribe started to join us — and then slowly, one by one, the tribe started to find alternative places to sleep. Steve found a cave, while the rest found somewhere on the beach or in front of the fire. No-one got any sleep night one; we decided to pull the base of the shelter off and start again. We learned that sleeping on the sand with some palm fronds would probably be a better option than on hard, round bamboo. We had just learnt our first lesson on Survivor : nothing is as easy as it seems.

On the morning of day two, we were awake and back being busy bees, sorting out things like wood for fire and coconuts and papaya for food, and starting to form relationships with our fellow tribe mates hoping to see if we could form any allegiances. My strategy was to see if I could make some true relationships and form some close bonds that would get me deep into the game. I started with Anastasia, as we have Ashtanga yoga in common, and Pia, whom I immediately liked upon first meeting.

We were all going slow and steady — perhaps a bit too slow and steady, as Steve Bradbury was off creating a seven-person alliance called the ‘sporting alliance’. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), being the ‘businesswoman’ of the group, I was left out of Steve’s alliance, along with a supermodel, an actress and a former Survivor player.

Survivor gets real

We rocked up at our first immunity challenge and I was nervous as hell. My strategy was to not be the weakest in the challenges in the early days so I wouldn’t be voted off for being a poor performer, but also to not be the strongest, so after the tribes merged I wouldn’t be seen as a threat. It was so important that I gave it my all so that I could prove myself. We walked into the challenge and Jonathan LaPaglia, the host, said ‘Come on in’ (which he says a lot), as if welcoming us into his home and not a scary challenge that could potentially end my game or my life (which I thought may be the case at times).

The stakes were high: the losing team would have to go to Tribal Council and vote one of their members off. This happens after each immunity challenge until there are only a few players left. Then a jury (made up of players who’d been voted out) votes for the winner, who gets to take home a nice little tax-free cheque of $500 000 (and bragging rights for life).

The challenge started with an obstacle course. We had to throw ourselves over three large poles, drag a seriously large wooden object across the field, lift it up, climb up a ramp and jump down some holes. The last stage was up to the two people we selected to throw the hammer at a target. (I often look back at these challenges and wonder at all the ways we could have been injured, but at the end of the day, when Jonathan said go, we’d go!) The Champions were the fastest to get to the end of the course but unfortunately it came down to the hammer throw, and we’d made the stupid decision to put up a speed skater and a model to do the throw when we had footballers and other sportspeople who would have been better suited. It cost us the game and the Contenders beat us. Nova was not happy. She’d put her hand up for throwing, as she is an A-grade cricket player, and potentially could have been better than David and Steve (as would have Simon and ET), but that is sport. We completely supported each other in defeat. But we still had to return to camp and actually vote one of these virtual strangers off the island.

We returned to camp and started to scramble. At this stage, I had no idea that there was a ‘sporting alliance’ — I thought people were still working it out.

Luke, who plays a great social game, was getting to know people and I was suss of him as I knew he was a good player. I immediately liked Ross and knew he was a good guy and I thought I could trust Anastasia. I was starting to get to know David, and, like with Pia, I immediately got on with Abbey, so I thought we might have a potential group of seven people. But in Survivor you actually never know who is with you until you read the votes.

Pia, Abbey, David and I went to the well with Luke to discuss the vote, and he suggested Ross because he was pretty noisy at night. As the group was talking, Nova walked up to us and I made a near fatal move by putting Susie’s name out. (My reasoning being that on a ‘Champions Tribe’ they would want to keep the team strong. Despite the fact that Susie is an incredible athlete and has achieved things that hardly anyone on the planet can, she was not an all-rounder and not strong on the ground. She lost her first reward challenge and she was clearly the weakest in the first immunity challenge.)

My strategy going in was to keep a low profile, not put names out and go along with the numbers to see the lie of the land, but what do I go and do? I wait until there are a bunch of people around and throw Susie’s name out there, without considering who might have made an alliance with her. I noticed that when I said Susie’s name, Nova said nothing and just gave me a look. I got used to that look as she was not a fan of mine, which she made very clear over the coming days.

Strategy blown. I was thinking — Bugger … I may be going home day one .

The day went on with lots of names going around, and I was told to vote for Pia. Despite really liking Pia from the start I was so concerned that the next name might be mine that I decided to vote with the numbers.

How the production works is that we’d get back to camp after a challenge and we’d have about three to four hours (depending on when the challenge finished) to talk and work out who to vote off. Then the production crew would call ‘lockdown’: this meant that we were no longer allowed to talk, look at each other or gesture to each other in any way. It was like we no longer existed to each other. Lockdown lasted until we were actually sitting at Tribal Council. In fact, we’d even get blindfolded in the van on the way to Tribal so that there were no last-minute plans. The production team take the game and the rules very seriously. By the time lockdown was called, I thought Pia was the one we were voting out. I did not know that there was a plan forming and that Nova wanted Anastasia gone because she was annoying her. Survivor lesson number two: don’t mess with Nova.

The first Tribal Council

We arrived to our first of many Tribal Councils. This is where we got the famous torches and were told that ‘fire is our life’: when Jonathan snuffs out the fire, you go home. We all sat on a log in the order we were directed to. Where we were sat ends up being very telling, as they make you sit with your alliance. I think they do this so that it makes it easier for you to talk during Tribal Council. It also ends up being a bit of a giveaway as to who was on whose team. At this stage we also discovered for the first time that those bloody logs are the most uncomfortable stools on the planet.

I was sitting next to Luke, who I was starting to get really fond of (that is his superpower). Jonathan started asking questions and Luke leaned towards me and whispered, ‘Are we still voting for Pia? How do you spell it?’ I laughed, said yes, shook my head and told him he’d be fine. We got up one by one and cast our votes, telling the Survivor gods (better known as cameras) why we voted that way, and then returned to the torture stools.

No matter how many times I sat at Tribal Council, through Jonathan slowly calling out the votes, I was always nervous that the vote was me. He read out three votes for Pia … then all the rest were Anastasia. This was my first blindside: when you think that everyone is voting one way and you are in the minority who is voting another way. In other words, you are on the bottom of the tribe.

Returning at night after a Tribal Council is always interesting; there is a level of discomfort, as everyone now knows where everyone stands. For me and Luke the news wasn’t good.

When we got back to camp Pia came up to me and thanked me for not voting for her. There was an uncomfortable silence, then I came clean and admitted that I actually had. We both laughed and Pia said she would have done the same; she understood that the first vote is really ‘anyone but me’. From that time onwards, I knew the only time I would write her name down would be for the win if she got there.

Going to sleep that night I knew I had a lot of work to do.

A win and a loss

All the challenges are scary and intimidating, but I found the pressure of the reward challenge a little less as it didn’t determine whether your tribe went to Tribal Council. Still, turning up to our second reward challenge was daunting. We rocked up and saw a round sanded area with a huge timber structure that turned in the centre (like the hands of a clock). A large post expanded out to the edge of the circle that we had to push on, in pairs, at the same time as a pair of Contenders, moving the timber around with all of our strength to step over the winning line first.

We started with our biggest boys and they lost. Up next were me and Abbey. Deep down I was happy to be positioned as the second strongest woman in our tribe. Abbey and I were a great team; she is a sporting superstar. I learnt quickly that there are two Abbeys: one is sweet, kind and wouldn’t hurt a fly, and the second is ‘game face Abbey’ who is fierce and you had better try your best to win or watch out. I personally like ‘game face Abbey’, as she is extremely motivating, and we won our round. Each pair came and went and eventually the Champions were victorious.

The team arrived back into camp smiling like Cheshire cats. Our cockiness was short-lived, however, as we lost the next immunity challenge. Suddenly it was my head on the block.

The sporting alliance was strong and they were very confident in themselves. My group was Luke, David, Pia and me; we needed Abbey and Rosco to flip so that I did not go home. We had to use all of our collective strengths and persuasive powers to make sure I did not go home. We certainly had the team to do it. Luke has incredible powers to convince people to do what he wants and knows the game better than anyone; Pia with her acting skills was convincing; and with my powers of persuasion I thought we had a real chance of converting Rosco and Abbey to our side. Rosco is one for his word, and he’d told me early on that he would not write my name down and I told him the same — so really it was just Abbey we needed to get across the line.

In my opinion the Champions were acting like a losing team by not keeping their strongest players, and I said so in my speech at Tribal Council. Nova was playing the blame game, which for me is the opposite of how Champions work. Luckily for me we got the numbers for the night and I got the joy of sleeping another night in the dirt. Did I mention that it rained that night? I was cold, wet and hungry, yet thrilled to still be in the game!

The tribe swap

If you watched the show you would have seen our alliance of players — Luke, David, Abbey, Rosco, Pia and me — were able to get Steve and Nova voted off before they got us. We also managed to do pretty well on the tribe swap. I remember during the swap being incredibly nervous, as all your hard efforts and prior negotiations can go out the window with the luck of the draw.

I was relieved to see that Abbey, Pia, Simon, Rosco and I had all pulled out the pink buff, becoming Contenders, and was also thrilled to see that we got ‘The Horse’ (Shaun Hampson) — I believed he was the main reason the Contenders were winning most of the immunity challenges. I also believed that I would work with Shaun long term, as he is one of the nicest guys you can find, and a real game player — which was what we were all there for.

The new Contenders team was Rosco, Abbey, Simon, Pia, Casey, Matt Farrelly, Harry Hills and Shaun; we had the majority and, to top it off, I had secretly found the Contenders immunity idol a few days earlier and could play it if needed. (Immunity idols are small objects hidden near the campsites. In our season, there was a Contenders idol hidden in the Champions camp, and vice versa. Whoever found one of these idols could only play it at Tribal Council to cancel out the votes against them when on the tribe the idol belonged to. My decision to hold the idol for an ‘insurance policy’ paid off — you get lucky sometimes!)

Our first win as the new Contenders team was the café reward. This is when I started to feel differently about David. Abbey, Pia and I realised that David was playing hard and not necessarily on our side. In my opinion he committed four mortal alliance sins:

1. Put out the name of one of your alliance (Pia).
2. Name one of your alliances as the ‘power couple’ (David told me the two of us were the power couple).
3. Promise one of your alliance members to go to the end with them (Abbey).
4. Think women don’t talk … (David, really??)

Now, of course, this is Survivor and lying is part of the game. But so is trusting your alliance — and if you do lie, you have to be pretty careful no-one will find out. Once we found that David was playing us, he was target number one.

But Survivor is complex; we knew we could not trust David, but we also knew we needed him as a number after the two teams merged. The best way to do this was to make David a mutual enemy to Shaun and us.

While on the Champions beach David made up a fake immunity idol. As I had found an idol, I had all the paperwork that he would need to wrap the fake idol in to give to someone in the future. As mentioned above I’d found the Contenders idol. Shaun had found the Champions idol. When David realised this, it was his chance to finally use his fake idol and get an idol of his own. During one of the challenges David swapped Shaun’s idol with the fake one; unfortunately Shaun never opened the package, so he never discovered it was fake. For us, it was easy: we simply told Shaun that David gave him the fake idol and then watched him go for David. Oh dear, men are so simple. (If you’re a man, I am joking … ish.)

We hoped that this would get Shaun to trust us and potentially be a number after the merge.

But I digress — what we did not anticipate was the Survivor gods throwing us a curve ball when suddenly Shaun was moved to the Champions Tribe.

This was good and bad for us. Good that they did not take one of us (former Champions), which would have weakened our numbers. Bad as it made us a weaker tribe physically, and it also prevented us from continuing to develop our relationship with Shaun further.

Despite losing the very powerful Shaun, we won the next challenge. Simon is a seriously talented sportsman; he was basically my coach and I listened to every word he said before each challenge.

This challenge was simple: someone had to dive under the water and pull a rope to keep a wooden trapdoor open while another member threw a ball through the opening; once the person could not hold their breath any longer, the opening would close. Simon was incredible on the throwing, and of course Rosco can hold his breath for, in his words, ‘as long as it takes’. We truly smashed the challenge, earning a night off from Tribal Council.

We did not know what was happening in the other camp; we knew David had an idol and I was sure Luke did too, but when we rocked up at another challenge after their Tribal Council David and Luke told us that they had used their idols and that they were seriously screwed without our help.

With the game of Survivor , you always have to protect yourself from the next vote, but also look ahead to after the merge (when all the contestants merge into one tribe). Former Champions were the majority in my current tribe; David and Luke were in the minority on the other tribe. We needed to keep David and Luke safe if we could so that when we got to the merge the former Champions would be in the majority. It’s all about being on the right side of the numbers. Our alliance had a long conversation about throwing the next challenge, so we could vote out a former Contender on our tribe. We were all competitive but this was Survivor and we had to outwit, outlast and outplay.

Despite the fact that David was no longer as trustworthy at that point, he was still someone who could get us further through the game. Every single one of us came to the conclusion that we had to throw the next challenge as we had the numbers in our tribe, and Luke and David did not.

In my opinion you cannot think one Tribal Council in advance; you need to think three or four moves ahead and make decisions based on this.

With our boys protected for another day we went to work out how to get rid of Harry, and with another immunity loss we had our shot. Casey was playing hard and going from Harry to us; she was hard to trust but she was also smart and she knew we had the numbers. I thought she would vote with us despite the fact that Harry told her he would play the idol for her. At the end of the day, Harry got the majority of the votes but with him playing the idol Casey went home.

Afterwards we had days to get to know Harry and Matt, and they are both genuinely good guys. At first, I was not sure of Matt, as he was all huff and puff at the challenges. But when you get to know him, he has strong character: he is a schoolteacher and someone that I thought I could work with. When we lost yet another challenge, it was Harry that we wanted to go … again.

As you can imagine there was a lot of running around, particularly with Rosco following Harry around 24/7 to make sure Harry didn’t find another idol. I am sure neither of them slept a wink. We now had the numbers to be able to split the votes. We would vote Harry off and Matt was the split vote; in other words, either Harry or Matt was going home. We were sure that Harry could not possibly have another idol, but just in case, Matt was our number two. Tribal started like it always did, with Harry playing the nice guy, while Matt was surprisingly aggressive. Once we went to vote, to our surprise Dirty Harry, the cockroach, once again survived another day. He played yet another idol.

Challenging times

The next reward challenge was one of the most confronting challenges that I did on the island.

Once again the challenge was at the tower of terror, with a plank that went out over the water. I am not really scared of heights but the idea of being blindfolded on a plank did not really rock my boat.

Abbey hates heights and Pia is not a fan either, so I went first out of the girls. They blindfolded me and walked me out to a spot where I stood for what seemed like hours while Jonathan was announcing the challenge.

We had to untie a rope and throw a ring in the water, then swim to the hook: the person who hooked their ring first won. I did okay; I untied the rope and was in the water quickly. Baden Gilbert however, got the ring on the first shot and I lost, which meant the reward was lost. (Did I tell you that I hate losing? I really hate losing.)

The immunity challenge was next, and it was in an area that was full of mud.

The mud was seriously up to your calves and you could barely walk, but when Jonathan says go, you do not think; you just do. Down the slide I swallowed a mouthful of muddy water, then, with a mallet in hand, I got to take all my frustrations out on a plank of wood. I have to say it actually felt really good.

Even though we had more women than men in our team we got to the end quicker and we were up to the puzzle first.

It was no secret that Harry was next on the chopping block so we thought it was fair that he had a chance at the puzzle, which he said he was quite good at and he was highly motivated to win.

Despite the fact that one member of the other tribe was trying to throw the challenge, we lost. Once again I got the pleasure of sitting on those really hard bits of wood at Tribal Council.

I have to admit, I was really starting to like Harry — he has the most amazing recipes in his head and a very cheeky smile — but this was a game and it was Harry that we wanted gone as we trusted Matt just that little bit more.

Later that night at Tribal Council Harry ‘Houdini’ pulled a rabbit out of the hat with another hidden immunity idol, and Matt went home.

One thing I liked about the people in my tribe was that they knew it was a game. So when we returned to camp it was pats on the back to Harry, and off we would go, plotting his demise or him plotting mine.

After this time I started thinking that maybe we actually needed to work together. If we could not eliminate Harry, then working with him might be the answer.