While Fish’s Utara became the first tribe to take possession of the Immunity Idol, their win over Selatan happened to be a close shave, following a series of ferocious neck-and-neck challenges in which Krige’s tribe more than once took the lead. Selatan will most certainly not forget this unfortunate defeat.

But first Selatan will have to bid farewell to one of their tribe members at the dreaded first tribal council, which will take place in the next episode, as this one ended on a surprise cliff-hanger.

The episode opened with the contestants set adrift on a raft in the middle of the ocean. They had to row over to host Nico Panagio on a boat, where he briefed them about grabbing all the loot they could gather from the vessel in one minute, before making their way to shore.

Having rowed their way to shore - with some contestants making more effort than others - the group assembled on the beach, where they met their captains for the first time. With little to go on, Fish and Krige set about selecting their tribe mates after a coin toss, which Fish won. He selected Solly first, with Krige opting for Marsha.

With the tribes selected, the captains faced their first challenge – three games that would win their tribe tools food, which would ease them into the game - the material they looted from the boat.

In the first duel the captains raced towards a stake holding a key to unlock a treasure chest with valuable items for their stay on the island. When Krige stumbled in the sand, Fish grabbed the opportunity to go for gold, scoring the first win for Utara. The treasure chest gave Utara a machete, rope, nails, a tarpaulin and other materials to build a shelter.

The next duel consisted of three rounds of ‘Reverse Tug-of-War’, with the captains strapped back-to-back to each other with a rope between them. Their mission: to pull each other to opposite ends of the beach and pull out bags of treasure, buried in the beach. In the first tense round Krige took the honours after digging his hands and feet into the sand to hold his ground.

In the second round, Krige won again, but not without fierce resistance from Fish. Thereafter, host Panagio offered the exhausted captains the opportunity to nominate a tribe member each to compete. Fish nominated the bulky, muscular Solly, an obvious choice for this sort of game, while Krige opted for Zavion.

Zavion shot up like a bullet, dragged a bewildered Solly across the sand, reached the rope within seconds and triumphantly pulled out the third treasure while his Selatan tribemates erupted in celebration. The treasure unearthed by Seletan turned out to be rice – vital sustenance for the start of the game.

In the final duel the captains had to rebuild a puzzle by shifting one piece at a time across three tables, with only smaller pieces allowed on top of bigger pieces. The winner of this challenge would be the first to pick from the loot the contestants took from the boat. With the assistance of tribe member, business analyst Stephen, Fish completed the puzzle well ahead of Krige.

If the 20 castaways and two captains thought that their first day on the island was tough, the first night brought them a ferocious tropical storm. So, with little sleep and some sore bodies they entered day two and their first Immunity Challenge, a spectacular game called ‘Waterworld’.

On Panagio’s signal, the tribes dashed into the water with Selatan building up an impressive lead. Unfortunately, they were crippled right at the end by not being able to fling a hook to satisfaction. That gave Solly a chance to show of his flingin skills, win the match and redeem himself for his trouncing at Zavion’s hands in the ‘Reverse Tug-of-War’ challenge.

Survivor SA: Champions is produced by Endemol SA and is broadcast on M-Net on Sunday nights at 19:30 and on M-Net Series Zone on Saturdays at 13:00.

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