Original subtitles

Yes! The biggest rock bath I have ever caught.

Physically, I can hold my own for a long time doing this. But emotionally, this

is getting more difficult.

The isolation is getting to me.

This is all I can handle.

I'm starving.

It's getting worse day by day by day.

Please God, help me.

I can either lose this or I can gut it out and win it. I want to win this bad.

Oh boy.

My whole gillnet is out there.

I'm going to try to set it up from the kayak.

Who are you when everything's been stripped away?

It's basically fighting an inner battle all day long. It's scary out here in

these woods.

I have not had a serious meal in a week. I can't get a player and I can't stay

here. It's always in the back of your mind. Well, I can tap out.

Putting up with this filming booth?

Running into a predator. It's not an if, it's a when.

Get the hell out of here. I see you. Get out of here!

I'm leaving this place.

That prize money would be huge. Yes!

Believe me, I'll keep fighting. Every step of the way, I'll keep fighting.

$500,000.

It can make things better for us.

How long is long enough?

Last thing I need is warm gear and my boots.

I

am

drenched in freezing cold water.

I can't even move.

About 85% of my clothing is wet.

Once they're wet, they're very difficult to dry in this environment.

Right now I feel pretty weak. I'm like an old, old man.

Oh, I'm sorry, Shauna.

I'm sorry.

That's nice.

It's freezing.

Sorry to my love, Shauna, to my family, my son, my friends, everybody I let

down.

I was pretty sure I was going to be here for a number more days.

But all my wool clothing is on me. My thermal clothing is on me.

And most important, the only pair of boots that are dry are wet inside.

Tonight, I wouldn't make it.

It's devastating when you tried so hard.

You lost so much weight as I have lost so much strength, like really ruining my

body just to push it one more day and another more day.

for love.

I would do anything for my family.

And I did.

I didn't quit because I ran out of love, did I?

I ran out of body heat.

I mean, like I say, it's the bush.

Things just happen. You plan and plan and plan and then the bush finds a way

to surprise you anyway.

Some things work out and some things don't.

In the end, nature rules.

We're just part of it.

You got that $500,000 reward over here.

Hey, look at me.

You want to tap?

You could have $100,000, $200,000, $300,000, $400,000, $500,000,

boy.

$500,000.

You want to sell your house?

You could.

With me.

Going nuts out here, man.

Frickin' nuts.

But I owe it to myself to give it, you know, 110% out here.

So that's why I'm not going to tap today.

What I think I'm going to do today is I think I'm going to make at least one

hand line.

What I'm going to do is tie a rock to the bottom of the fishing line, tie

probably four hooks up.

Tie that piece of styrofoam up at the top to be a float.

And then I'll just tie that line off to a rock or something over there.

You never know. I mean, I could get a fish out of it. I'm pretty hungry. I

could use a fish. I could use anything.

We'll see what that does.

Also, I'm pondering the idea of chapping birds.

All right, well, I cut part of my gill net off here, and I got a little piece

of rope.

All I'm going to do is just kind of prop this gill net up on this rock as best I

can. And then I'm going to take some bait and crush it up and kind of throw

it down inside of this gill net so a bird, when he lands, has to land on top

of the gill net, and we'll see if he gets tangled up.

It seems to tangle just about everything else up, so we'll see if we can get a

bird.

I don't care what kind of bird I catch. I just want to catch something, man.

I don't even care if it's a bird. I just want protein. That's all I want.

I just want something to eat.

How long can a person go out here?

If there wasn't a tap button, you might go, you know, a guy might be able to go

another couple weeks. Who knows?

I mean, you'd go until you die, right?

They say if you do something for three months, it's no longer an experience.

It's a lifestyle change.

That's kind of how this is starting to feel.

My lifestyle is now the hermit of Desolation Cove.

Physically, I am getting weaker and weaker.

It's getting to the point where my body's starting to really ache, really

hurt.

I'm feeling my age.

Everything that I do, all the tasks, all the energy that's being expended is

coming from me.

And there's not a whole lot of me left.

But if I take a rest from it, I don't eat.

If I don't go fishing today, I don't eat.

I literally am living hand to mouth.

I've lost a lot of muscle mass, and to have to stand there all day and do a

task like fishing, it's painful.

Maybe a younger man would have a better time at it. I don't know.

There's a lot of riding on me staying unbroken out here.

If I allow myself to get injured, I'm done.

Yes! No!

Oh!

Oh, my knees!

Yes!

No! It came off the hook!

I

banged my knees

bad.

Oh, he fell off the hook.

Oh, they're here.

Oh, my knees.

You know, I'm 50.

It's got to put a drag on anybody.

It's going to take a while just to recover from this.

And I wonder how much.

my body can take.

When you watch this at home, it must seem so easy.

All you've got to do is just gut it up and sit there.

It's not that easy, man. I've already been out here 60 days.

It ain't like it's been a week.

It ain't like it's been 10 days.

It's been 60 frickin' days, man.

I hope my friends and family are proud of me for how difficult a journey this

has been.

Holy crap!

Holy crap!

What the hell have I done?

It takes a long time to get your feet wet when you're first being dropped.

Red alert.

God.

At first, it's more physical than it is

mental.

You're starving. All I think about is food. I've never been this hungry ever.

A little baby fish.

Oh, and I let him go.

The emotional aspect of being alone so far haven't really reared its ugly head

with me.

I have a mouth in my mouth.

That stupid mouth follows me when I come down here. I'll turn around, and there's

the freaking mouth.

I swear to God, if that thing freaking chews my sleeping bag up, I'm blowing

this place up. I'm going to have to make a change. It's not the world that needs

to change. It's me that needs to change.

It's my outlook on life.

And I hope while I'm here, it will help me find.

what that outlook needs to be.

Oh, my God.

To get out of that confining space, to be able to see this, man, just the

emotional uplifting this is going to give me is huge.

This new location has given my self-esteem an incredible boost.

That's a big one.

Oh, man, that's pretty good, actually.

Sure is pretty country.

There are things worse I could be looking at.

Just freaking squished like a damn pancake, baby.

Yeah!

This is the toughest physical challenge I've ever done.

If you look up wore out in the dictionary, my face is right there, just

like a mugshot. Just wore out.

Once you get really far into it, then it becomes very, very mental.

Damn it.

My needs on day 50 are completely different than on day 30 because my

mental aspect is going down the tubes.

I'm struggling with giving it all I got because there damn sure ain't a lot

left, I can tell you that right now.

I don't remember ever giving up anything in my life.

My wife's going to be in her heart. I know she's going to be disappointed in

me.

I just feel like I'm letting her down so bad, man.

Please, God, help me.

Please help me.

Please,

God.

Please.

I knew I needed some suffering in my life here in this journey.

in order to change.

This journey has opened my eyes to just how lucky and how fortunate I am.

I need to stop being such a half-empty kind of guy and just be more positive.

I can either lose this, or I can gut it out and win it.

I freaking want to win.

I want to win this bad.

What I have to do is just man up, and go as long as I can.

But survival here is not easy. It's just not easy.

How long can I take it? How long can I take it out here?

How long can you take it for?

How long can I take it out here?

Not very much longer, man. Not very much.

When I went down after that fish, I injured myself severely.

I bruised my knees something fierce.

And I got to wait a couple of days for these knees to kind of heal up a little

bit.

I wonder how much my body can take and at what point I would start being very

unwise to continue.

I wasn't in bad shape when I came out here.

I've been working out steadily for months.

getting ready for the potential to maybe do something like this.

Thank you for the ride.

That's it? You're just, like, going to leave me here?

You're just leaving?

I am home.

This is hard work. This is not an easy thing to do, and it's unrelenting is

what it is.

Oh, my goodness.

If I can't make this cove produce food, I won't make it.

That's the catch of the day.

Some kind of gnarly-looking seaweed.

Starvation really does get to you.

My body's disappearing, and it is scary.

There is nothing in my gill net that mocks me.

I want to do well. I'm sick of being the dad that always has to say no. Hey, can

we go out there? No, you can't. Dad, can I help? No, you can't. Can't afford it.

So you have that prize money would be huge.

Two weeks out here and no fish to show for it. That's embarrassing.

I have to learn how to fish these waters.

I'm really hungry.

Yeah, baby!

I'm going to have a meal.

I'm going to have a meal.

Oh, that is good.

I haven't been able to fish these waters close to a week or so.

My gill neck has been destroyed every place I've put it. This cove tears

everything to shreds again and again and again.

Part of me just is screaming to go home, but I can't do that to my kids.

Pray for my kids every night.

And I really miss them.

That's the hardest thing about being here.

Everything else they can handle.

I can't bail on the opportunity to help my

kids the way I can if I just see this thing through.

I'm just going to focus in on my little tiny universe here and making life as

good as I can in it.

What's your sleep number?

The only thing that's worked for me so far to get food out of the cove is a

hook and a line. Yes, that's number six, folks.

Woo!

Suffice to say, this is a feast of a lifetime.

This place, it changes.

It's kind to you, and then it's rough to you. It's like a very fickle place. It

can turn on a dime.

I lost my line.

Dang.

Oh, I just fell in.

Hypothermia is a very real threat.

I mean, I'm feeling the cold right now.

The weather just has been brutal.

We haven't had a cold like this in the daytime since I've been here.

Weather like this, it makes people tap out.

Kind of a crappy day to be here in Desolation Cove. We put the desolation

in Desolation Cove, definitely.

In the beginning, there was lots of days in which I didn't need anything.

There was lots of opportunity and fish and things going on out there. I just

didn't know what to do with it. I didn't know how to get it. And now that I do,

I'm consistently hitting on fish.

That's how survival goes.

Dinner!

I know that emotionally this is getting more difficult.

Definitely.

There's that hierarchy of human needs.

If you don't have air, you're not going to think about water.

If you don't have water, you're not going to think about food.

If I have food, then I start doing things like missing my kids. I start

thinking about the fact that I'm alone.

I'm beginning to understand and learn how human contact is a basic human need,

that we really do need this social interaction. We're social creatures, and

we're not designed to live alone.

Missing my kids is wearing on me.

The daily strain is, you know, wearing on me.

It's hard work.

Recovering from an ordeal like this at 50 is not the same as recovering at 25.

I know that for a fact, that it's going to take me longer to get back into

decent shape. It's going to take more effort. It's going to take some

discipline.

And the longer this goes, the harder that will be. And I'm looking forward

to the day when this is done, one way or the other.

Oh, God, I feel like puking.

All right, settle down.

I never quit enough in my life.

to ignore the fact that I had that little black phone in there, which I

could use to call base camp and tap out.

It's a matter of, yet again, confronting the fact that I'm out here surviving by

myself until I get rescued.

Do I want to?

Can I?

Oh, yeah, I'd like to.

My mind won't let me, man.

Wow.

Man, the level of exhaustion is off the charts right now.

And my neck is killing me.

I did the best I could, man.

I did the best I could, man.

She's a tough cookie, huh? Yeah, yeah.

Mentally, I broke.

I didn't just quit. I broke.

It's just been emotionally trying, dealing with all the cravings and all

the hunger, and I'm just done with it.

I'm starving.

I don't need to go hungry anymore. I'm done.

The only reason that I wanted to tap was because I was going to die.

I was going to have no calories left.

You can't tap until you leave everything out there, man.

If you tap before you leave everything out there, what the hell did you sign up

for?

Being out here has indeed humbled me. It has made me realize that I'm not quite

as tough as I think I am.

I don't have the skills that some of the other folks do, but I got some pretty

good willpower.

What I've really discovered about myself is that I have to focus on

what my wife talks about all the time.

Just stop worrying about the fact that you're grinding away and working.

And just think about the little things in life.

And what I've come, and I've always known this, but my family is freaking

awesome.

And I need to start showing my appreciation for that.

This has been the hardest thing I've ever done in my entire life.

This will be one of the greatest achievements I've ever done.

But it's just...

Super, super disappointing. I couldn't make it to the very end.

It's like I always tell my kids when they were in sports, you know, leave it

all on the field. Did you give it your all?

If you did your best, that's all you can do.

You can't never do more than your best.

I did my best, man.

That's all I can say.

How do I answer the question, how long can I survive out here? Well, I don't

know.

Keep going, David. Keep going. Don't stop now.

This is hard.

I get hungry during the day, and I miss my children, and I don't have any body

reserves to draw on anymore.

So if I don't get food going in, I have to burn me.

I don't have a whole lot of me left to burn.

But to give up, I feel like I would be giving up on my kids' future or a chance

at that future.

And I just can't bring myself to do that.

It's not about the money for me. It's about the money for my kids.

Because right now, I don't have any way to help them go to college. And to me,

that is huge.

Yes!

Thank you, Lord.

Look at the size of this fish.

I have stew tonight.

I think I'll know when I'm not making it anymore.

But right now I feel like I am.

104 over 72 is your heart rate.

A lot of pressure, sir.

I've got a lot of questions about recovering from a thing like this, but I

guess I can wait for me to actually be done with it.

I'm not done yet.

Not even close.

We're heading into day 70 soon, and I feel like I could keep going.

Of all the people that get a chance to do this thing, I get a chance to do it.

You know, all the people that applied for this thing and maybe got a chance to

do it, I get to do it.

So, yeah, I want to do this.

Why go home now?

I'm eating crab. I mean, I am eating Dungeness crabs practically every night.

Why would I go home now?

And somebody said to me right before I left, well, 50 hasn't slowed you down at

all. And I'm like, yeah, baby, you know, that's what.

Well, I go home now.

And somebody said to me right before I left, well, it's just he hasn't slowed

you down at all. And I'm like, yeah, baby, you know, that's what.

I did this for you guys. You know that, right?

Oh, my goodness.

You did it.

I did it. You did it.

You came all this way just jumping.

Oh, my goodness.

I

get

to go in that boat today, don't I?

You're coming home.

I get to come home.

Oh, my goodness.

So, I want to see what you did. You want to see what I do? You want to see right

how I live? I've been waiting.

This is my cove.

That is absolutely beautiful.

Yeah, it doesn't always look like this.

When it's sleeting and the wind is howling through here and stuff, no, this

is idyllic. It's like the perfect dish.

I've never had money in my life, so I have really no idea what.

I would do if I had money.

I'm pretty enthusiastic about figuring it out.

No, there's some things I want to do to help you guys.

Yeah,

beyond that, I don't know.

I mean, I just have to survive that.

Everybody can go home.

Yeah, you can get the ride in the helicopter.

for a beautiful day.

Oh, wow, this is so cool.

Gotta admit, I did not picture myself leaving in the helicopter.

Where's the helicopter ride, Edward?

I do have a love-hate relationship with this place. You get up in the morning

and you confront the realities of your situation.

Some days it's great and some days it's horrible.

But suffering has value.

We avoid it at all costs.

We would never want to go back and repeat it.

But it has value.

It's a part of life.

And nobody gets through life without suffering.

Nobody. The question is, what do you allow it to do in you?

You can allow that suffering to make you bitter, angry, just a wretched person.

You know, you can allow that suffering to eat away at your soul, turn it on

itself, and just... chew you apart, or you can look for the deeper meaning in

it.

My philosophy on suffering is that God's trying to teach me something, and I know

that in the end, I get to keep those lessons,

and the pain goes away.

I was back in the world of laws.

I was bound by a different set of laws out there.

I was bound by the laws of nature. I was bound by the laws of the wind and the

tide and the weather.

Nature dictates its own terms to you.

You know, it was allowing me to survive in that cove on its terms.

A ton of my kids kept me going the whole time I was out there.

There was a lot of days with doubt.

in fear of quitting would come up, I would just think of Karina, Daniel, and

Aaron and how they gave me the freedom.

They knew that I had to do this. And I get to go there now and tell them it's

all going to be different.

And that feels really good.

I'm really looking forward to this moment.

I feel stupid so much.

I feel you too.

Get in here, girl.

Daniel,

what happened to you? You're like a foot taller.

Seriously.

I'm done. I'm out of the bush. I'm home.

I'm going to be here for a while now.

What's the news?

What's been going on?

Did you think I'd be gone this long?

No.

No, you thought I'd be back sooner?

You thought I was going to win?

I did.

What?

I won.

I left.

Everybody else left.

Except for me.

I wish I knew it. I wish I knew it. I didn't know I could do it.

You guys gave me the confidence to do this.

Daniel, Karina, I am now the dad who says yes.

Okay? I'm the dad of yes.

Dad, can we do it? Yes.

Now I want everything different.

I am totally at peace with my world right now.

I have seen my kids.

I'm just riding this wave of exhilaration.

Nothing can bring me down.

The bush is something which will always be in my blood, but I regained a sense

of gratitude for the life that we have out here.

I certainly value human company more than I ever have before.

Human company is something we can't afford to take for granted.

The most valuable facet of your life are your relationships.

And to not value them is a real detriment to quality of life.

And I realize that now more than ever.