02x01 - Kalahari

[bunniefuu]

I'm going to be careful
because these old Weaver bird

nests are absolute perfect
homes for the Cape Cobra.

Stretching from South Africa north through
Botswana, Namibia and all the way to the

Congo is a parched expanse of sand known
as the Kalahari Desert.

The rolling red sand dunes
seem to go on forever,

broken only here and there
by flat, sun-baked pans.

Very few people dare to live here.

Existence is harsh.

Running out of gas can be a fatal disaster
in the desert.

I've got an old 4x4 with not much in the
tank.

When it runs out, I'll have to survive
alone amongst the cobras and the scorpions.

But they are not my greatest foe.

It's blisteringly dry.

Not surprising for a desert.

Sandstorms are not only common,
they're deadly.

But it's the heat that's the k*ller.

Two days ago here, it hit 42 degrees
Celsius.

That's 107 degrees Fahrenheit.

And the temperature of the sand can reach
an amazing 75 degrees Celsius.

That's 167 degrees Fahrenheit.

That's hot.

But the heat doesn't deter the legendary
Kalahari Lion from surviving here.

This is not a place where I can let my
guard down.

Once my gas runs out, the clock starts to
tick on my week of survival.

That's it.

That's the end of the diesel.

Oh, man.

Now, the safety crew heads off and leaves
me alone to film the ordeal myself.

One week.

Alone in the Kalahari Desert.

I can tell you this much.

This is not the time to panic.

Broken down in the middle of a scorching
hot desert.

This bucket of bolts here is gonna be a
deadly heat trap.

So, all I'm gonna do now is get over to
some trees and wait out the heat of the day.

For centuries, the Bushmen
of the Kalahari have

survived by sitting still
during the heat of the day.

And it isn't taking long for me to figure
out why.

The heat is oppressive.

As the sun's fading, I'm gonna go back to
the truck and sleep in it tonight.

There's no point in me sleeping on the
ground here.

This place is crawling with scorpions.

Check out all the holes.

Big scorpion hole.

Scorpion hole.

Scorpion hole.

Scorpion hole.

Scorpion hole.

Scorpion hole.

And this one is massive.

See, the thing is, the scorpion is as wide
as its hole.

That's incredible.

When the sun goes down in the desert,
it's instant relief.

That sun is relentless.

For me, I have to think about my
priorities now.

The first priority is just to get through
this night in the back of a pickup truck.

Just going on a bit of a scorpion walk.

In this bright moonlight, I can see the
ground really well.

I can see things crawling on it.

I don't really spot anything yet,
though.

Surprising.

I mean, there's thousands of holes.

And there's lots of activity.

You can see their tracks.

Truth is, probably my
walking itself stomps on

the ground, scares
them back into their hole.

Same thing happens with snakes,
too.

We live in fear of creatures that are far
more afraid of us.

It's still quite warm.

My challenges this week, they're pretty
obvious.

The heat and the thirst brought about by
that heat.

And tomorrow morning, I'll get up real
early.

See what I've got.

Take stock of my supplies and what I can
make use of.

Well,

this is where I ended up spending the
night.

In the cab of the truck.

The sun is just about to come up.

And, as you can hear, my head's all
clogged up.

Some kind of sinus congestion.

So, you can't pick the times that you're
going to fall into peril.

I came out here knowing I had this head
cold anyway.

But, I just got to deal with it.

What.

I'm going to do now is check and see what
came with this truck.

What I have that I can survive with.

You would think it would be a simple
matter to rip apart a vehicle.

But, in fact, with only a multi-tool at my
disposal, it can be pretty tough.

Most of the nuts and bolts are too big
anyway, or they're rusted on.

But, as is typical with a work truck,
it's full of useful junk.

Couple of buckets.

Wow, I've got groceries.

Oh, good.

Some instant coffee.

No coffee pot.

Not much water.

Sure.

Empty can of pop.

Another empty can of pop.

That'll be a tease.

Some empty cups.

A sugar container from a restaurant.

Now, why would anybody have one of those?

I don't really know.

We'll see.

But, for real...

A jar of peanut butter.

And a can of jam.

Never had so much luxury.

There was no option.

I had to come out here with water.

Otherwise, if I'd been here in the
Kalahari Desert in the middle of summer,

without water, I would have perished
inside of two or three days, guaranteed.

You need at least a
gallon of water per person

per day to survive
in this kind of heat.

So I've got 20 liters of water here.

That's basically about four days' supply.

When I survived one
time in the Arctic, the locals

there gave me some raw
seal meat to take in with me.

And here, the locals have also given me
something to bring in to eat.

Part way through the week.

An ostrich egg.

So you're gonna hold on to this.

See how much luck I have on my own first.

And crack this when the need arises.

Down there is where the illusion of a
mirage happens.

It's just a big, wide, flat pan.

There's not an ounce of water down there.

It should come as no surprise that
exposure to the sun is deadly.

And I need to find protection from it.

Here, that means nothing
more than a few small

shade trees, each at
least a half a mile apart.

It's barely 10 o'clock and it's 35 degrees
Celsius in the shade.

So there's a real reason
why the Bushmen of the

Kalahari don't move much
in the middle of the day.

I can't get over how intensely hot it is.

All I can do is lay here and I'm feeling
waves of heat sort of blow in.

One thing I should definitely not do is
take any of my clothing off.

You, in fact, preserve more of your
moisture by keeping fully clothed.

You don't wick away perspiration off your
body as quickly that way.

So it might feel a little cooler to take a
shirt off.

I mean, aside from the obvious huge risk
of sunburn, if you keep your shirt on,

it helps to actually keep more moisture in
your body.

It feels like I'm in a slow cooker.

Oh, boy.

On the second day of my ordeal in the
Kalahari Desert, survival comes down to

hiding from the sun and
paying attention to the

small details before they
become big problems.

It's really important that, whenever
possible, you dump the sand out of your shoes.

And never, ever walk in bare feet.

You'll end up with alkali burns on your
feet.

Your thirst is not enough to determine
whether or not you need to drink water.

If all you do is
satisfy your thirst, you

can still bring yourself
down to dehydration.

If you ration your water down to two
quarts a day when you know you have more,

you could be inviting disaster.

It's almost controversial.

Some people say, don't ration your water.

Drink it.

Drink what you need.

Drink the gallon or so a day.

Other people who get out
there also say though, yeah,

but you know, after a few
days, you run out of water.

It would be nice to at
least be sipping some

water than to have
guzzled it all down early on.

So staying hydrated out here is critical
to my survival.

And no small task in the middle of the
Kalahari Desert in the middle of the summer.

And there is no substitute for water.

You can hear about using different liquids
or alcohol or whatever.

No substitute.

It's water that you need.

In this heat, I move
slowly while I work on

some of the supplies
I pulled from the truck.

This is the rope that was on the back of
the truck.

It's just too big for anything I might
have a need for right now.

Let's see if I can make it smaller.

So now that I've got this separated into
three ropes, I can take it down even more.

Into smaller rope and then down even into
string.

Protection in a
survival situation is vital

from the elements and
from dangerous critters.

It's not paranoia for
me to fashion together a

spear to protect me from
the deadly Cape Cobra.

They can be aggressive and move fast when
they want to.

So hopefully this will work.

If I need it to.

The snake comes along.

Like this.

And I've got this on the end of a pole.

I can trap it.

Hold the head down.

It becomes a bit of a protection device.

But it's also going to be used for
hunting.

Even in one of the
hottest places on the

planet, fire is still
important for my survival.

If I am able to get a fire going, I'm
going to need to be able to travel with it.

I'm just working on a fire bundle.

Comb through this brittle prickly dried
grass to get the dead stuff.

Leave the green stuff behind.

I grabbed some vinyl from the truck to use
to wrap around it.

And there's some dung around.

I don't know what kind of dung it is.

But it's an ungulate, so it's a grass
eater.

And it'll probably work pretty well.

It'll hold it in there tight.

And you do want it to be very tight
because you don't want it to burn.

You just want it to smolder for as long as
you have to travel.

Well, in the fading sunlight, now that
it's taken its toll on me for the day,

and it's losing some of its strength,
I'm going to see if I can't get something

else from this truck that I can make use
of.

We've got a piece of the fuel line.

With any luck, there'll still be some fuel
in this line because even though your

engine runs out of gas, there's often just
little tiny drips of residual fuel.

And the line is where they might settle.

So, if I want to be
able to start a fire, and

I need some gas,
this might be all I have.

I'm going to put it right into this guy
here.

Yep.

And I can do one better.

Oh, yeah.

Stealing oil from the oil filter.

That should keep this thing smoldering
really nicely.

So, I've got my fire bundle, and it's been
impregnated with gas and oil.

And all I have to do is get a spark into
it and get it burning on the top tomorrow.

And with any luck, I'll be able to travel
with fire when I get out of here.

Oh, I can see by looking
in the viewfinder of

the camera, my face
is getting awfully red.

Oof.

Going to be a piece of toast by the end of
this week.

This is a major score.

These beans...

I already know from research...

to be edible.

Little as they call them poops,
we call them seeds.

The tree is known locally as the
Camelthorn tree.

This is great news.

Heat stroke and heat exhaustion can k*ll
you.

It's not just a matter
of overheating, it's a

deadly process of your
body not being able to cope.

And eventually, or sometimes in short
order, it shuts down.

I feel like I'm overheating.

Like I might have heat exhaustion.

I'm feeling pretty nauseous.

And I feel like I can't cool down.

My body is just radiating so much heat.

I sacrificed a bit of
water to put on my

bandana and to get
around my carotid arteries.

Because that's what you want to do.

You want to... you want
to... cool your blood down.

I'm gonna have to keep a real close watch
on this if it gets...

worse.

And I'll have to call this off.

I stopped taking the temperature out there
today at...

when it hits 60 degrees Celsius in the
sun.

It's the second night in the Kalahari
Desert.

And the most dangerous night I have ever
faced.

For hours I have flirted on the edge of
near-fatal heat exhaustion.

Obviously, maybe I pushed it a little too
hard today.

Even though I sat in the shade for a long
time, I mean...

It was like being in a worldwide...

of a...

This is the toughest night of survival
I've ever experienced.

This is completely...

and radically unusual.

I don't get days like this during the
summer in the desert.

And yet I've got what,
to me, looks like a

generally overcast,
rainy, spitting kind of day.

And that's fantastic.

It means that I can travel without k*lling
myself in the heat.

So, I'm gonna finish up and get my gear
together.

Get a few more things from the truck.

And...

I have to try and get that fire bundle
burning.

And then I hope this holds out.

If it could last all day, it would suit me
fine.

It's raining.

And it feels great.

I should see if I can find a way of capturing
this water if it really starts to rain.

If the wind.

doesn't come up, I've got myself,
hopefully, a bit of a rain catch.

It's back to the truck to see what else I
can salvage and use for survival.

I can use these for my next trick.

Okay.

Yeah!

Oh, yeah!

Look at that!

Look at that!

Look at that!

Look at that!

Oh, yeah!

All right.

Let's get that fire bundle going.

And it's starting to rain all at the same
time.

Woo-hoo!

Almost set the truck on fire, mind you.

The jar of peanut butter wasn't actually
full.

There was only a few tablespoons in it.

And it's not the nicest thing to eat in
this heat.

I'm sad to say that I don't think there's
going to be any more rain coming in.

And I've got to get going, so...

However, as small of an amount it might
be...

...it's still better than nothing.

Mmm.

Ah, bonus water.

Thank you, clouds.

After grabbing the salvaged items from the
truck, I'm leaving this area.

To make my way closer
to the safety camp, I'll

need to travel a few
hours across the desert.

Avoiding the sand as much as
possible will help, as it's much

easier to walk around the
hard-packed ground by the grass.

But it means walking through very active
Cape Cobra territory.

After many hours of walking, I need to
stop.

I've only spotted a few shade trees here
and there, so on this lonely dune,

I'll set up camp.

As strange as it may seem, I still feel
the need for fire, even here in the desert.

And the smoldering fire bundle has worked
perfectly.

You know what?

I guarantee, when this storm comes in over
top of me, it's gonna be going like crazy.

It's gonna be blowing like mad,
so...

It's all calm.

The sun's shining over here.

It's black there.

I better go batten down the hatches or I'm
gonna regret it.

Yeah.

This is pretty much my bedroll.

I'll just keep it hidden away to see what
happens with this storm.

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like my
storm's gonna come in.

I was hoping for some relief by getting
rained on, but...

It's going all around me, but not coming
over top of me.

Well, it's a beautiful full moon,
but I've got a bit of a conundrum.

First, the wind is blowing hard from the
north, and I'm protected where I am.

My little fire.

Then there's no wind.

Now, the wind is blowing
really hard from the

south, so there's systems
that are swirling around.

And, of course, with it blowing hard from
the south, I've got to watch my fire.

It doesn't take off on me and blow off
into the grasslands.

Last night, I was almost
succumbing to heat exhaustion,

and tonight, at 27
degrees Celsius, I'm chilled.

I'm cooling down.

So, if I stay here, well, you know,
I'm underneath a big Shepherd's tree.

Not a good place to be in terms of Cape
Cobras.

They come through these trees.

They like to go up into the trees.

They rest up in the trees, and when it's
humid like this, they'll be active.

So, I think this is going
to be one of those,

prop up the backpack
and sleep sitting up nights.

I've survived through heat exhaustion,
felt the relief of a desert rain,

been chilled by last night's
cooling winds, and it's only

been three days out of seven
surviving in the Kalahari Desert.

So, this is where I ended up spending my
night.

I had to come over here in the middle of
the night, be protected from the winds.

So, now I've just got to regroup,
figure out my priorities.

I've got to get some food, so I want to
get out hunting.

Here, let me show you this Weaver bird
nest that the cobras like to live in.

So, it's not the safest location,
but it's the only shade for miles.

Just cracking this can of jam.

It's day four now.

Peanut butter is long gone.

And I could use some food.

Oh, wow.

Pure sugar.

I almost can't eat that.

Whoa.

Unfortunately, that sugar is going to make
me want more water.

Okay, all of this junk here, I scrounged
from the truck.

And I can use this stuff to make some
traps.

With these little containers to use, I
have in mind one particular type of prey.

See, it's really a simple
matter of just creating

a big hole for the
scorpion to drop down into.

You want it to be as straight down as
possible.

I think time to put this peanut butter jar
to use.

You just sort of make it
so that when he comes

out the hole, he just
drops right into the jar.

The hoses from the truck will work as
excellent traps.

A natural place for critters to hide in.

Inside, I'm putting the
jam that I found to be so

ridiculously sweet that
it almost made me sick.

It'll be better utilized as bait.

Setting traps or snares has nothing to do
with guaranteeing me food.

But it keeps my mind
occupied, keeps my frustrations

at bay, and gives me
hope for a better situation.

It's all about bettering the odds.

As the temperature
climbs once again, it's

time to hide in the shade
and work on my spear.

So many survival tools
are made much easier

with some knowledge
of a simple knot system.

So the string went up.

Like a round.

The string went up.

Then I looped it back and pulled it.

Then I went around it some more.

And here's the end.

Put the end through the loop.

Okay.

Okay, so that's just loose through the
loop.

But the end of the loop...

comes out here.

So this, you see, it'll pull.

And it will tighten that.

And pull it down...

through.

And that effectively...

locks off all of this banding here.

Let's go hunting.

There's a critter up in this nest.

It gives me a chance to try out.

My new spear.

I'm gonna be careful because...

these old Weaver bird
nests... are absolute...

perfect homes...
for the Cape Cobra.

Big ol' locust.

Ooh, he's a big one.

Dinner.

You do have to be worried
about... what bugs you eat.

If they're brightly colored...

this guy's not.

Or if they smell... really
bad... this guy smells fine.

Those are some things to watch out for.

That likely means that they're toxic.

This one, I think, is gonna be just fine.

I hear him sizzlin'.

It's kinda poppin' like popcorn.

there.

There we go.

There we go.

There's the edible part.

Hmm.

Bottoms up, eh?

Hmm.

It's always surprisingly good tasting.

Feels like it's gonna be gross.

When you get in
there, it's like... huh.

That's pretty good.

The locust, or big grasshopper,
whatever it is... tasted great.

But the sad part of this night is...

see into my water.

Finishing my water changes everything.

There is no greater struggle than staying
hydrated...

in a survival situation in one of the
hottest places in the world.

Every desert is a place of wild temperature
swings... and here is no exception.

It has hit 65 degrees Celsius, 149
Fahrenheit... on the surface of the sand.

The temperatures in a few days have gone
from...

a high of 42 Celsius, 107 Fahrenheit in
the shade...

to 7 degrees Celsius, 44 degrees
Fahrenheit... in the middle of the night.

You know, I spent the beginning of this
week...

absolutely dreading the rising of the sun.

Trying to get as much done as I could
before... it came above the horizon.

And now, this morning, I find myself just
praying...

for it to get above that
horizon... so I can warm up.

I've been up all night... just
trying to stay warm by the fire.

There are a few ways to find...
or even make water in the desert.

And if there was ever a time for me to
pull out all the stops...

and rehydrate, it's now.

The bushman would come...
and cut into these roots...

and take the pulp...

and squeeze the water into their mouth.

It feels juicy.

It feels wet.

Oh, yeah.

Look.

You see the moisture?

Mmm.

Oh, yeah.

Lots of juice.

Like, I just got a mouthful
of juice... from that little bit.

Cover you over.

Now, I'm just gonna keep coming back to
this...

and taking chunks and...

sucking on the juice as much as possible.

It's a pretty powerful full moon.

And I'm gonna use it.

The Weaver bird nest by my shade tree is
dried up and dead.

But not far away, there is a fully active
nest...

and it presents a good opportunity for me
to hunt some food.

The birds might be small, but they nest in
numbers.

Thanks to the locust, I know the spear can
work.

Whether or not I can use it effectively is
another story.

Come on, come on.

sh**t.

Well, they're here.

I just blew it.

All right, this is nuts.

I didn't sign on for this.

I'm up because...

I'm freezing.

It's the middle of the
night and... it's quite cold.

If I... wasn't using all of the containers
I have... to try and catch scorpions...

and if I had any water...

I'd be... using the water
in the container to...

boil me up something to get me warm.

maybe make some of that coffee.

Ha, ha.

Oh, this is nuts.

This wasn't what I was expecting.

It's been more than 12 hours without
water...

and five days with only a few dry
beans... and a locust in my stomach.

I should have had some of those Weaver
birds last night.

They're fast, though.

Fast and small.

Sun feels good this morning.

Take some chill out of my bones.

Probably won't say that in about three
hours.

Okay.

Hey!

Hey!

Baby!

This is... I got one.

Let me show you.

Got a second one.

Yeah!

And a third one.

So that's three scorpions out of four
traps.

Very cool.

One, two, three.

And they've been there all night.

They're not going anywhere.

Let me... There's a
trap just down here.

I'm gonna check in.

I got another scorpion.

All right.

Now comes the job of...

getting the scorpions out of these cups.

I've got to cut off the stingers,
which is where all of the poison is held.

Humans can ingest poison from snakes and
scorpions because it's simply a protein,

but not if you have an ulcer or a stomach
injury.

For me, just the thought of the stinger
getting stuck in my throat is enough.

Wow!

He pinches hard!

Ooh, this one's lively.

There we go.

My scorpion kebab.

Sun's getting hot today.

It's coming over top, but I'll be shaded
here in just a moment.

So let's put these guys on the grill,
shall we?

There we go.

In spite of my frustration with not
catching a Weaver bird last night,

half a dozen or maybe ten of these
scorpions probably might be very close to

the same amount of nutrition as one of
those tiny little birds anyway.

Yeah!

Breakfast.

A little gritty.

You have to kind of do this quick and not
think about it.

The more you won't do it.

So, the ostrich egg, finally.

Day five.

I'm gonna cook it up.

All right.

Hold in the top of the egg.

And take a stick, break the membrane,
and I'm just gonna mush it up a bit inside.

Oh.

Whoa.

Doesn't that look like one massive egg?

That is so cool.

See how she tastes.

Oh.

My.

Gosh.

Wow.

That...

is amazing.

Mmm.

Oh my gosh.

Mmm.

This kind of rich food on a stomach with
no liquid in it is dangerous.

As of today, this is by far the best egg
I've ever eaten.

Not long after eating the egg,
I'm feeling painful stomach acid.

From eating only the ostrich egg and having
very little liquid going into my body.

So I'm grabbing some of the charcoal from
the fire to eat.

It counteracts the acid and will calm my
stomach.

While I was resting in the shade and
eating the ostrich egg, my fire died on me.

I found a tiny piece of chocolate in a
wrapper in one of my pockets.

Okay.

And I can put it to good use.

Here it is.

Just a little bit of chocolate.

And apparently I can take the chocolate,
Polish up with the wax that's in the

chocolate, Polish up the bottom of this
can.

The idea is the concave nature of the
bottom of the can should focus a beam of

sunlight into the tinder and start it up
just like you would use a magnifying glass.

It's hard to do.

There's light there and it's just coming
back onto the grass.

Right there.

I'll leave the can and the tinder bundle
in the sun to hopefully do its thing.

While I wait, I'll see if I
can make water by trapping

leaves in one of the
plastic bags from the truck.

And I'm not gonna stop
there because I also know

a safe way to utilize my
own urine to make water.

Time to do the deed.

The last bit of pee I can muster up.

Urine is approximately 92% water,
but the rest is harmful toxins that if

ingested would over toxify my blood and
k*ll me.

So if I could distill
some pure water out

of my urine, I might
just get a small drink.

Alright, this is a urine still.

Basically, all I did was
create a depression to

put the cup and then I
peed around that depression.

Then I put the cup in, cover it over with
this plastic, and as the urine evaporates,

the distilled water
will collect on the top

of the plastic and
drip down into the cup.

At least, that's the hope.

It's day six and I've built two stills to
hopefully collect water.

And with my fire out, my only chance to
get it back rests with the pop can,

the intense sun, and some tinder.

It's working.

It's working, it's working, it's working.

It's working.

Amazing.

Absolutely amazing.

I really didn't think I had a hope in
anywhere of getting a fire going with a

piece of chocolate, some sand,
and the bottom of a pop can.

I'm not going to freeze tonight.

Well, I...

Sorry, I was really hoping to take you to
the Weaver bird nest tonight and give it

another shot at catching some Weaver
birds.

But after only 24 hours
without water in this

dry, dry heat, just
sucking on the juice of a...

the root of a plant for moisture,
I'm already lightheaded and dizzy.

I just didn't think I
could make the long,

long walk to where
the Weaver bird nest is.

You know, it's not so much the heat,
it's convection.

The wind just blows almost constantly,
and it's always just sucking the moisture.

It just sucks it right out of your body.

And, uh, I mean, it was still hot today.

It got to the high 30s Celsius.

It's the high 90s Fahrenheit.

And, uh, it did its number.

But, uh, it's been 24 hours, we'll just
have to see how I do tomorrow.

And it's going to get cold again tonight.

I can feel it, but it's not as windy.

So, a little saving grace.

Did I mention that scorpions are attracted
to fire?

They come in for the warmth.

I hate thinking about stuff like that when
I'm drowning asleep.

I've been surviving under
this old Weaver bird nest for

too long with the thought of a
cobra hanging above my head.

I figure I'll break it down now,
just for some reassurance.

I guess it's safe to say there was no
cobras in that nest.

And since I've been sleeping under it for
a bunch of nights, that's reassuring.

I'm just going to go and check the, uh,
traps close to where I'm camped out here.

Check that one out there.

There.

I caught some... Look
at the size of that guy.

He's covered in jam and sand.

This may look like a tasty meal to a
starving person.

But unfortunately, the reason
they are so slow and seem

worry-free of attack is that for
most predators, they are toxic.

A small amount of cyanide makes them
mildly poisonous.

It's time now to check on my water
collectors.

First, the year ends still.

I'm just trying to get the condensation to
finish dripping, you know?

down the plastic, let the bubbles of water
collect, the drops of water collect,

and drip into the cup.

A little tiny bit of sand in there,
but...

It's like fresh, clean water to me.

There is...

just a tiny bit of water...

that I've collected using this...

tree... solar still.

Well, for me right now, it's definitely
better than nothing.

Mmm.

Oh.

Just that.

Tablespoon of water.

And an ant or two.

And, uh... Just to feel
the moisture in my mouth.

On my lips.

That little bit.

That helps.

Dehydrated, I am suffering from migraines
and debilitating headaches.

I can't continue.

The truth is, I do need water really
badly.

It's almost been 48 hours without water.

And with very little water.

And my head is dizzy, and I'm a little
disoriented.

My legs are wobbly.

The safety crew camp is a few hours walk
from here.

So...

I'm going home.

Very well..

I'm going home ladies.

One more time...

With the wind that's noisy, and it each
was so great for me to have to touch with you.