Subscribe
Jobs
Cars
Real Estate
Apts
Classifieds
Shop
Hippos, elephants and leopards, oh, my!
And we’re not talking just any old hippos here, but surfing hippos (or more accurately, hippos frolicking in the surf).
Tonight, CBS’ venerable reality franchise “Survivor” returns for its 17th cycle with “Gabon: Earth’s Last Eden,” which sends 18 castaways to the lush nation on the Atlantic coast of west central Africa to compete for a $1 million prize.
It’s not the first time the show has been to Africa – the third cycle was set in Kenya – but it’s the first time it’s ever been broadcast in high definition.
Some might wonder whether they want to see dirty, bug-bitten contestants in HD, but host (and newly minted Emmy-winner) Jeff Probst observes, “See, I would flip it. I would say I had no concern over the scabby, bug-bitten contestants. They’re vulnerable. They’re playing for a million dollars. It’s that extremely likable but not-19-years-old host that I’m looking out for.
“It was a little humility pill for me, because HD is unforgiving.”
Probst also said that the wildlife of Gabon was a little different than that in Kenya, which is more used to seeing visitors. In Gabon, the animals vanished when the “Survivor” crew arrived, but they didn’t stay gone.
“When the show started,” Probst says, “suddenly, in the middle of the night, you have an elephant making his way out of the jungle into the camp where the survivors are.
“There are a couple of times when there’s an elephant within the same frame as a survivor.”
Along with park rangers, the show also had animal experts on its payroll to deal with curious critters.
“When a 12-foot African rock python slithered into our camp,” Probst recalls, “Josh, our wildlife guy, got the call on his radio, and in 15 minutes, he’d captured it.”
Wandering leopards also made getting a late-night snack a little dicey.
“Of the first two weeks we were there,” Probst says, “there were probably seven or eight nights that we had leopard prints in our catering area. That was a little unnerving.”
