The Amazing Race Canada threw a major curveball at the remaining Racers this week by sending them to a city most don’t think of when it comes to international travel: Jakarta. For a great in-depth peek at why Jakarta was chosen and the unique challenges of filming there read Bill Brioux’s Toronto Star piece.
Taylor and Courtney, the RCMP siblings, kicked off this Leg and were psyched to be jetting over 13,000 km to Indonesia. And with a Double U-Turn ahead, things were going to get sticky temperature and gameplay-wise. The top three heading out of Vancouver—Courtney and Taylor, Anna and Todd and Mar and Leanne—may be among the strongest and evenly-matched The Amazing Race Canada has ever had. At least, they look that way just four Legs in.
After arriving at Fatahillah Square to receive their next clue, Kwame and Dillon found themselves in first place and watching the welcome dance alongside Leanne and Mar. Would the football coaches and football cheerleaders hold those top spots until the end of the Leg? Not likely, thanks to bad traffic, stifling temperatures and frayed nerves. A jaunt to the old port presented pairs with a prickly test: carry durian from the dockside to crates on board a boat by traversing wobbly logs. Slow and steady was the order of the day to complete the task. Sadly, slow and in the wrong direction was what Kwame and Dillon and Anna and Todd both experienced and they fell far behind.
Leanne and Mar were done in a flash and departed for the bird market and the Blind Double U-Turn, where teams who U-Turned others would be anonymous. Leanne and Mar didn’t U-Turn anyone. Neither did Courtney and Adam. Nancy and Mel, however, U-Turned Martina and Phil. Zainab and Monica chose to U-Turn Todd and Anna.
The Detour presented teams with Ular (washing and drying a snake and then putting leeches on each other) or Kebaya (sewing panels and then attaching them to the inside of a woman’s blazer). Despite the grossness, I would have done the snake/leech challenge in a second. Leanne and Mar chose Ular too, as did Courtney and Adam, Mel and Nancy and Monica and Zainab. Seriously, why would anyone choose to do sewing unless they had to? Speaking of teams who were in for a nasty surprise, Martina and Phil’s cab arrived off the mark and then learned they’d been U-Turned.
Credit to Martina and Phil for not getting down. Instead, they sprinted to Kebaya where Martina called on her home ec skills to tear through the test. The siblings passed Todd and Anna as they swapped Detours. Whoever finished first would likely edge out the other team for the last spot in the mat.
Nancy and Mel shot to the head of the pack thanks to hungry leeches and were off Gedung Teater Bulungan for the next clue. In this week’s Road Block, Racers participated in the Dance of 1,000 Hands, learning a complicated hand and body movements of the Saman Dance. Nancy, Adam, Leanne, Taylor, Adam and Dillon all took a shot at it, with Leanne being the first to complete the task. Nancy was close behind and the two teams were off to meet Jon Montgomery in Merdeka Square. Leanne and Mar held on to take the top spot, landing a trip for two to Vietnam.
The biggest story of this Leg was Martina and Phil who, despite being U-Turned by Nancy and Phil, finished in sixth place. Todd and Anna, who may very well have won this season of The Amazing Race Canada, were derailed by the U-Turn and never recovered. Next week the remaining teams are headed to Stratford, Ont. I got the chance to observe that Leg; look for my spoiler-free preview later this week.
Which team do you think will win it all? Would you have cleaned a snake or sewn a blazer? Let me know in the comments below!
Here’s how the teams finished this Leg of the Race:
- Mar and Leanne (trip for two to Vietnam)
- Nancy and Mel
- Dillon and Kwame
- Zainab and Monica
- Taylor and Courtney
- Martina and Phil
- Courtney and Adam
- Todd and Anna (eliminated)
The Amazing Race Canada airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET/9 p.m. MT on CTV.
Images courtesy of Bell Media.
