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No Babies On The Race

Rob and Amber, after their third first place finish in a row, in Petrohue, Chile leave with instructions to fly more than 800 miles to Punta Arenas, and find Lord Lonsdale's Shipwreck. At the airport, they quickly book tickets on the 9:40am flight, and then grab a computer to research the shipwreck.

Uchenna and Joyce, Eric and Danielle, Oswald and Danny and Dustin and Kandice also manage to get onto the 9:40am flight, but Teri and Ian get to the airport in time to see that the flight is full, and they have to make a later flight, departing at 11:15am. Amazingly, after some serious begging, some seats open up and they make the earlier flight.

This puts just Joe and Bill and Charla and Mirna on the later flight. Joe and Bill try and hide at the airport, but it doesn't work very well, when they are on the same flight.

Arriving in Punta Arenas, Rob and Amber take the lead out of the airport, with Rob having snagged the directions from a flight attendant who was supposed to give them to Uchenna. At the airport, teams encounter the Detour for this leg, where they can choose between Navigate It and Sign It.

In Navigate It, teams had to use a map of Punta Arenas to get to the town plaza where a sailor would hand them a compass. Then, using the compass, the teams needed to walk directly south to find the Nautilus Building, a deep-sea salvage business. In Sign It, teams had to choose a pole and building supplies and carry them up a flight of stairs to Magellan's Map. Using the map as a reference, teams needed to figure out his journey around the world began and ended> in Seville. Then, they had to build a traditional local signpost listing, in order, the fourteen ports of call in his voyage. While the signs didn't have to point in the right direction, all the cities had to be spelled correctly. Are you listening, Rob?

Rob and Amber chose Sign It, and made good progress, until they found that Rob couldn't spell. He quickly made work of the start and end points, but had endless problems with "Philippines". So much so that they eventually gave up and did Navigate It instead. If you are ever have the luck to run the race, I would suggest not switching tasks, especially after you have put time into one. If you absolutely must switch tasks, do it early or you will probably suffer. Consider this foreshadowing if you like. Uchenna and Joyce, meanwhile, had problems with Seville being the beginning and end points, but they could spell. So they made quick work and moved on. Other teams went directly for Navigate It.

In Navigate It, Eric and Danielle jumped into the lead, and there learned that they needed to return to the airport and head to Ushuaia, Argentina, about 165 miles away, and find Playa Larga Beach. Eric and Danielle secured seats on the first charter from the airport along with Oswald and Danny, and a very happy Teri and Ian.

The second flight finally landed in Punta Arenas carrying Charla and Mirna and Joe and Bill, and Rob and Amber were still working on their signpost. Dustin and Kandice, however, were having a problem because they thought that the direction of the signs mattered (remember, it did not). About this time, these two teams decided to team up and do the other task together, since the other plane was about to catch up.

That's when Charla and Mirna started building their signpost, and Joe and Bill started navigating. Joe and Bill actually passed Rob and Amber and Dustin and Kandice, but they only made the second charter flight.

For the first teams arriving in Ushuaia, a surprise awaited. Teri and Ian actually took the lead (albeit for a brief while). They quickly went right past the flag, as they often do, and lost the lead. They wandered the hillside while Oswald and Danny and Eric and Danielle made it to the cluebox, discovering that they had to take a taxi to Bahia La Pataia. At the bay, they would take a boat to the post office at Isla Redonda, also known as the End of the World. Boats would leave every twenty minutes and could take at most two teams.

At the post office, Eric and Danielle and Oswald and Danny opened their clue to find a Roadblock. In it, one team member has to sort through a mail bag full of 1600 envelopes to find one of two letters addressed to their teams. What they did not know was that a team from their first season on the race wrote the letter. Once they found their letter, they had to read it aloud to the other teammate, and they could receive the next clue.

Oswald and Eric started searching, and though Danielle thought Eric might do the job, Oswald found his envelope first. After reading the letter from brother and sister team Blake and Paige, Oswald and Danny could open the clue to head to the Pit Stop at Mastil de A.R.A. General Belgrano, an overlook situated on the southernmost tip of South America.

After being near the top for the last three legs, Oswald and Danny finally made it to first place. Even better was winning a trip to the Royal Lahaina Resort in Maui. Eric and Danielle made it in second after finding their letter from their former partners, Jeremy and Dani.

The second charter flight finally landed, and Charla and Mirna and Rob and Amber were stuck without taxis. After asking an attendant to call for one, Charla and Mirna had to watch Rob and Amber take the taxi when it arrived. You have to keep an eye on Rob. But what goes around comes around. That's foreshadowing again.

At Playa Larga, Rob and Amber sent Charla and Mirna in the other direction (this time it was mostly Amber). It all came back to haunt them as Rob was left sorting through mail as Mirna unloaded her letters and found hers before Rob found his, and a footrace actually eliminated Rob and Amber. So much for the three-time first place finishes.

• Oswald and Danny are no longer under the radar.
• Eric and Danielle moved up, but I don't know how long they'll be around.
• Teri and Ian are hanging in, but it may not be for long.
• Joe and Bill are blowhards and they will not last.
• Dustin and Kandice can win it if they can get back to the front.
• Uchenna and Joyce just come and go too much and won't be here long.
• Charla and Mirna somehow keep hanging on, so you never know.

I will say that I was surprised to see the first-to-worst finish of Rob and Amber. I didn't really expect them to win it all, but I figured they would be around for a while longer. Shows what I know.

I'm still picking Oswald and Danny for the win, because I like them and I like the laid-back attitude. But Dustin and Kandice might do well too.