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Michelle Wohlberg is the only other Canadian who toughed it out up north for the upcoming season. For her, the Arctic trials and tribulations very much paralleled her life growing up in rural Saskatchewan.

Photo by Courtesy of Nikki van Schyndel

When it came time for the helicopter to plunk down all the survivalists in the middle of a wintry nowhere, both women couldn’t have felt more in their element.

“I was so excited to see that thing go,” van Schyndel said.

To prepare, she focused on honing the skills she would need in the Arctic: laying traps or practising with her bow and arrow. She studied the show religiously, analyzing why former contestants tapped out and how she could overcome the obstacles they incurred. Wohlberg did the same.

Due to their contracts, both can’t reveal too much of what they experienced on the show — you’ll just have to wait and watch their journey week-by-week.

Contestants are allowed to take up to 10 items from a pre-constructed list to help them survive. Van Schyndel took an an axe, saw, knife, sleeping bag, paracord, pot, trap wire, fish hooks, a Ferro rod and a bow and arrow.

Loneliness didn’t consume her; if anything, the hardest part about surviving alone was having to film herself. “It’s so hard to set up three cameras while you’re trying to hunt,” she laughs. “You’re stuck behind the lens and you’re not fully engaged in the moment. You need to be fully engaged in the moment to survive successfully.”

Knowing hunger, knowing cold, knowing fear. That's kind of my thing

Quickly though, she was able to get the hang of it. “I just decided I was going to be authentically me on this camera. I shared everything. My quirky stuff, my goofing off, my crying, baring my soul to the camera and not knowing what was going to be edited. It was freeing.”