A new episode of Survivor: Kaoh Rong airs tonight on CBS. Read a live recap and join the discussion here.
The Gondol tribe returns to camp after tribal council. Tai is thankful to still be in the game, but he feels bad that Anna was blindsided. Meanwhile, Peter contemplates disbanding from the rest of his Brain tribe members since he was on the bottom of his original tribe. He approaches Tai about aligning together to vote out Joe. Peter says he’s ready to make some moves in the game.
Over at Chan Loh, Nick comments on bonding with his new tribe members. He fakes a persona to bond with Debbie to keep her close. Debbie says in her confessional that she used to model and she thinks Nick is attractive enough to be a male model. However, she won’t let that affect her strategy in the game. The tribe gets ready for the reward challenge. The message from tree mail alludes to a basketball-like challenge. Nick notes how they’ll be going against a former NBA player, but he will still give it his best shot.
At the reward challenge, Julia returns and joins the Gondol tribe. Jeff tells them about the challenge, which will require one tribe member from each tribe to dive into the water to release buoys from a net. Afterwards, the tribe members must help get the buoys to shore. Lastly, one team member must shoot the buoys into a basket. The first tribe to get all ten buoys in will win reward (a picnic). The challenge begins with Michele and Aubry diving into the water to release buoys from a net. Aubry gets the Gondol buoys released first as her tribe members jump into the water to help bring all the buoys to the shore. Michele finally gets the buoys, but Chan Loh are still behind Gondol. Scot starts shooting for Gondol, but keeps missing. Nick soon gets to start shooting the buoys for Chan Loh. It’s soon a tied game with 3-3. Nick even manages to take the lead away from Scot. However, it’s tied again at 8-8. Scot takes the lead again and gets his ten buoys into the basket first. Gondol wins reward!
At the Gondol tribe, Julia gets to work on bonding with her new tribe. She chats with Peter, and he finds her to be trustworthy. He tells her he wants Aubry to go next, and Julia is on board since it’s not her name on the chopping block. However, Aubry and Joe are bothered by Peter isolating himself with Julia. They see Peter and Julia out in the water, and Joe calls Peter a dope. They thought the easy decision would be to vote out Julia, but Aubry now thinks they should consider taking out Peter instead.
Over at the Chan Loh tribe, Nick is frustrated with himself for not winning the reward challenge for his team. Even though he was up against an NBA player in a shooting-a-buoy-into-a-basket competition, he thought he still should have won it. Meanwhile, Michele is worried she’s on the chopping block since she feels she cost the tribe the challenge since she took a long time to release the buoys. She tries to form a deal with Debbie, and Debbie seems on board. Debbie says she wants the girls to stick together and they should target Jason. Michele goes to Nick to share her idea of working with Debbie, but he shoots it down. He tells her they need to stick with Brawn instead. In her confessional, Michele comments how bothered she was of Nick talking to her in a very condescending manner. However, she says she will just go along with whatever plan keeps her out of the line of fire.
The next day on Gondol, Peter takes a walk on the beach with Scot. Peter tells him he wants Aubry to go next. Joe sees Peter talking to him and wants to call him out. Joe takes Peter aside and asks him if he has been telling people to vote him out. He tells him to don’t lie, but sees right through Peter as he dances around the question. Joe says he is done with Peter.
It’s time for the immunity challenge. Each tribe will have to race through a series of obstacles, including going over a large barrel and a net wall. Afterwards, they must maneuver blocks on a canopy with poles as they stand underneath it. Once they get all the blocks down, they must stack them together. The challenge begins, and it’s pretty even for the most part until they get to stacking the blocks. Gondol tries a risky strategy proposed by Peter as they try to carry multiple blocks at once, but several blocks fall while they stack them. Blocks fall onto Joe too, causing his face to bleed. Chan Loh has some blocks fall too, but they manage to stack them all before Gondol gets to recover. Chan Loh wins immunity!
Gondol returns to camp, and Aubry reconsiders voting out Peter. Even though she doesn’t trust him, she is afraid Julia, Scot, and Tai will then team up to take out Joe and Aubry once Peter leaves. Joe is unhappy with keeping Peter in the game, but he realizes Aubry is right. Joe goes to talk to Peter, and Peter agrees with taking out Julia. He said his plan to blindside Aubry failed, so now he just wants to go with the flow. Later, Scot approaches Peter to see if the plan is still in place, but Peter says he is voting out Julia. Scot is angry that Peter is sticking with the Brains, so now Scot, Julia, and Tai contemplate voting out Peter instead. They know Joe and Aubry are afraid of being taken out, so they approach Aubry about everything Peter was planning to do. They throw Peter under the bus in hopes of getting Aubry to flip. However, Scot and Tai are unsure if Aubry will flip, so they wonder whether they should just vote out Julia. Aubry, however, is torn and uncertain how she will vote tonight.
It’s time for tribal council. Jeff asks Julia about joining the new tribe, and Julia says she notices it’s a split tribe and it will be interesting to see how they all vote tonight. Aubry and Scot both agree that it’s a new tribe and nothing is necessarily set in stone yet. They say it all comes down to trust. Jeff asks Scot is it’s a constant juggling act of what to do. Scot agrees, and he says the dissension worries people. Aubry says she is concerned by what people have said to her. While Jeff is asking Joe a question, Aubry turns to Scot and asks him if he’s voting out Peter or Julia. He says Peter. Tribal council ends with Scot telling Julia, “Original plan.” Jeff notices and points out how up in the air everything is before they cast their votes.
We see Julia vote for Peter and Peter vote for Julia. We also see Aubry write down Julia’s name, but seems unsure whether to cast that ballot or not.
Jeff read the votes. The first vote is for…
Peter
Julia
Peter
Julia
Peter
Julia Peter
Peter is the sixth person voted out of Survivor: Kaoh Rong. Aubry crossed out Julia’s name and wrote Peter instead.
And that wraps up tonight’s episode of Survivor: Kaoh Rong. Thanks for reading, post your thoughts of the episode in the comments section below, and come back next week for another live recap.