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It's a cold morning as everyone drives to Reims for their first clue: a champagne cork reading Leclerc Briant. Most teams have an okay time finding it, where they have to rappel down into the catacombs searching for a special bottle. The Cowboys, however, drive to Champagne instead. This is not as much of a disaster for them as you might think, because Brent and Caite go to the wrong statue, half the other teams are sent to the wrong place for the destination, and Steve and Allie damage their car and have to patch it back together with duct tape.
Meanwhile, the Detectives proceed to Taittinger la Marquetterie, and have to choose between stacking champagne glasses and searching acres of vineyard for a flagged grape cluster. Choosing the latter, Michael and Louie win their third leg in a row. Stupid Brent and Caite yet again reach the Pit Stop a clue short by following Carol and Brandy in before doing the Detour, then spend the rest of the leg switching Detours and bickering like grade-schoolers. But they make it to the Pit Stop while Jordan and Jeff are still searching through the grapes by flashlight. So that's it for Team Big Brother.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!I just figured out while watching the previouslies that in his WWI uniform in France last week, Michael looked a lot like Jean Reno, only more alert. Not that this does me any good now.
"These are the pastoral fields of Northeastern France," Phil says, in one of his most non-specific intros yet. "During World War I, they were a place of tremendous conflict," he continues over footage of last week's Detour, during which it was a place of tremendous fake conflict. "Today, they are a virtual sea of tranquility between tiny country towns such as this one," but when he says the name of it, the cowardly closed captioning cuts out on me again. The Pit Stop sign reads "Verdun, France," so that's no help. Anyway, Phil concludes, "This quaint [nameless] town, with a population at last count of 43, was the fifth Pit Stop in a race around the world." So apparently the entire town's population turned out to greet the racers yesterday. The first team to arrive, Michael and Louie, are now leaving at 7:47 AM. The cloudy sky behind them is a spectacular pre-dawn blue as they open their clue on a muddy, windy field that is patently not the village street where the mat was at the end of the last leg. "Drive yourselves to the city of 'Reems,'" Michael reads. Phil narrates that it's a 37-mile drive to Reims, whose correct French pronunciation I couldn't even begin to approximate here other than to say it sounds like someone trying to sneeze quietly and backwards. Phil says the city was started by the ancient Romans and liberated from the English by Joan of Arc, and its Gothic cathedral (which we now see partly covered by restorer's scaffolding) was traditionally the site of the coronation of French kings. Presumably they don't use it for that any more. Outside the cathedral is an equestrian statue of Joan of Arc, impressively wielding a sword. to this statue, a street musician is playing a "singing saw," which brings this from the sublime to the silly in a hurry. She'll give the racers their clue. And a crazy-eyed smile, looks like. But then one doesn't expect a musical saw player to be particularly well-adjusted in the first place.
Walking to their car, Michael talks about the cold morning in typical "we can do this" fashion: "France feels just like December in New England," he says, but he's sure it's harder on the other teams. "I'd be wearing my boxers out to get the newspaper this morning," he boasts. Thanks for that image. They interview a bit about how glad they are to have won two legs in a row, and are now merely amused by the other teams. "We're gonna own this continent," Michael says. Pride goeth before Philimination. Or the Finish Line. One of the two.
Steve and Allie are leaving at 8:04 AM, and it looks like the sun has just come up. The clever clue reads, "Find the only outdoor statue of Joan of Arc, then listen to what you saw." Geddit? Saw? Allie complains about the cold, then, in the back seat of the car, she can't seem to manage the navigation and wants Steve to look at the map. I think one driver, one navigator is how this is supposed to work.
Jet and Cord leave in third place, at 8:13. In the back seat, Cord is at a loss looking at the map, and he tells Jet to stop at "any place of business" at "this town," which basically looks like a row of barns from this angle. "I'll see if I can find us a 7-11," Jet says agreeably.
Dan and Jordan open their clue in fourth place at 8:17, just hoping it'll send them someplace warm. Once they reach their "warm Mercedes," Jordan tries to make sense of the clue. "Maybe this Joan of Arc speaks...She goes, 'My name is Joan of Arc.'" If she uses the falsetto voice that Jordan just used, that would be less dignified than the musical saw player.
Carol and Brandy leave at 8:39, in fifth place. Driving through the village, Carol points out, "My house." She and Carol talk about having a house here and a flat in Paris. Win the race first, ladies.
Michael and Louie have reached Reims, and Michael is at least aware that he's probably mispronouncing it.
Steve leans out to ask a guy if he speaks English. "Little," is the answer. Steve asks him if he knows where the Joan of Arc statue is, and gets a blank stare in return. As they drive on, Allie wonders what French for Joan of Arc is. "Maybe it's Arc d'Joan. Like Arc d'Triomphe is Arc of...Triomphe." Oh, she's almost there.
Also lost are both sets of brothers. Dan and Jordan flag down a commuter who points them to the cathedral in a French accent so thick they think she's saying "Cathy Drone" at first. They thank her and resume their drive, as Dan complains, "People really do not speak good English here." The mouth harp twanging away on the soundtrack tells us what an informed remark this is in a non-English-speaking country.
Brent and Caite are leaving at 9:48, and begin the leg by looking for someone to get directions from. Solid strategy.
Michael and Louie get out of their car to wander around on foot. A sign points to four separate destinations, two of which have the word "Cathédrale" in them, but Michael decides to go to the Office de Tourisme, which fortunately is one of the ones that also says " Cathédrale." Steve and Allie, however, are also out of their car, and have found a local to guide them over to the statues. Thus they're the first to find the "musician," and she leaves off her low-tech Theremin playing to hand them the clue. It's in the form of a champagne cork whose end is stamped with the legend, "Champagne Leclerc Briant" on one end. They ask their local guide where this would be, and are sent to Épernay. Steve's already looking forward to some bubbly. Doesn't Allie ever get thirsty?
Michael and Louie are in the tourist office asking for directions to the Joan of Arc statue, and are directed to the square they're currently right off of. It's also the same square Jet and Cord are approaching, on the quite solid logic that people put statues in squares. They get out and run along the sidewalk, dodging dog crap. They're suitably impressed by the size of the cathedral, and find the saw player doing her thing in the statue's shadow. They get their clue in second place as the Detectives are arriving. After reading their clue, Cord interviews, "You know there's a town about forty kilometers down the road named Champagne?" Why no, I didn't. Any particular reason you bring it up? They're already on there way there, while the Detectives return to the tourism office. You know, to get directions so they don't end up in the wrong place or anything.
Dan and Jordan are jogging up to the statue of Joan of Arc on her horse, Jordan informing Dan in a scholarly way, "That's how she's most often depicted." Yes, that and on fire. They get their clue, and Jordan thanks Joan expansively before running off towards a sign that Dan asks Jordan to translate for him. "Office de tourism," Jordan guesses, which is quite a leap given that it reads "Office De Tourisme.<.i>" Inside, they find the Detectives. Hugs all around before they get back down to the business of directions. On the road to Épernay, Jordan babbles about champagne. "Is it like wine and then you just add, like, club soda?" I don't know; try mixing some up and tell me what it tastes like. I wouldn't want to waste the club soda.
Carol and Brandy get their clue , "currently in fifth place," and run off singing about champagne. Their new French neighbors are going to love them.
Jordan and Jeff are leaving at -- get this -- 10:28 AM, almost three hours behind the leaders. I do like how there hasn't been a lot of flying so far this season. It not only cuts down on the boring airport stuff, it really reduces the bunching that comes from everyone having to leave on the same flight that always seems to take off more than twelve hours after the first team leaves the Pit Stop. Of course the downside of that, at least for Jordan and Jeff, is that they still haven't recovered from that detour to the sticks of Hamburg two legs ago, and the only reason they're still in the race at all is because of the non-elimination in that leg and the U-Turn in the one after it. "We got some catching up to do," Jeff understates. Before starting out, he says they're there for a reason. "We have to take advantage of that reason, try as hard as we can, and we'll catch up." Apparently he is unaware that this reason is our own mean-spirited entertainment. In the car, Jordan drives as she plumbs the depths of her historical knowledge and recalls everything she knows about Joan of Arc: "He carried all the animals." Jeff laughs at her, as he should, and adds, "I wonder why we're in last?" Jordan's at least willing to laugh at herself, unlike some people. You'll see what I mean by that later.
Steven and Allie are lost trying to get to Leclerc Briant, so there goes their lead, as the brothers follow the detectives right to the place. Inside, both teams open the Road Block clue at about the same time and read the question, "Who's ready to cave in?" Spelunking?
Now here's Phil, standing at a table and telling us about champagne, "the centerpiece for countless rituals of celebration. And today, teams must learn how to party like it's 1799." First, they'll "rappel" down a narrow, hundred-foot-deep airshaft into the winery caverns below, if by "rappel" you mean "be lowered like a sack of flour." Then they'll have to search among thousands of bottles in racks to look for one that is "specially marked," which in this case describes an Amazing Flag that's just the right size to be attached to a toothpick. When do we get to the 1799 part? Oh, here we go: "Then, in a tradition established by the soldiers in Napoleon's army," Phil continues, "they'll celebrate their victory by using a saber to slice the cork off the bottle." So when Napoleon was running amok in Europe, all he really wanted was a corkscrew? "When they do," Phil says, "the pressure will cause the champagne to shoot out, along with their clue." And then they just have to risk being run over as they run out into the street to get it.
Somehow Dan and Jordan are in first place, and the latter is doing this one for the brothers, while Louie's doing it for the detectives. "I'm gonna fricking pee myself," Jordan says has he gets into his harness at the mouth of the hole. He interviews that Dan has done three Road Blocks in comparison to his one, so he was gung-ho to do this. He sits on the edge of the airshaft -- which is illuminated with light cords running down each of the four corners -- and a bespectacled greybeard who will apparently be joining him on the ride down assures him, "No problem, no problem." Which will turn out to be true, as the racers who have to "rappel" won't actually be called upon to do anything other than not flip shit. They start getting lowered down. "I am rappelling down a freaking wine cellar right now," Jordan marvels. Please see definition of "rappelling."
Steve and Allie arrive belatedly in third place. "Steve, this is your kind of place," Dan greets them. Someone already has a reputation as a tippler, it seems. He'll be doing this one. Jordan has just reached the bottom, and now has to begin his search. This is no small task, because the catacombs are lined with champagne racks shaped like inverted Vs. Each rack contains sixty bottles on a side, and they have two sides, and the racks are lined up in pairs. So that's 240 bottles per row, and these rows stretch down the curved hallway as far as the camera can see, with side hallways branching off. It's like if Neo said in The Matrix, "We need champagne. Lots of champagne." "Okay, this is a little bit trickier than I thought," Jordan confesses as he snoops among the bottles.
Louie is now getting lowered into the hole with a different guide. Obviously, with the airshaft being so narrow and there being only one of them, it limits this activity to one team at a time. It effectively creates, no pun intended, a bottleneck. Down below, Jordan's search continues, as he sticks his head under and inside the racks. "It's much harder down here than you would think," he says. Oh, don't worry, Jordan, I think it would be hard.
Jet and Cord have reached the town, and now all they need to do is get directions. Unfortunately, they're in the wrong city, which is what the first person they ask tells them. "We went to the wrong town," both of them interview. "It was a problem," Jet admits. Back into their car, with a very concerned "Oh, my gravy." "It wouldn't be hard for us to be last right now," Jet says. You'd think so, wouldn't you? "Navigation was not our thing today," Jet interviews after the highly suspenseful ad break, and in the car, Cord says, "We just lost about another sixty kilometers." Fortunately, when you translate that to miles, it's probably less than the drive from their home to the nearest movie theater.
Jordan finally finds the bottle he's looking for, and finds the stairs back up to ground level. Good thing he doesn't have to "rappel" back up, because Louie has just emerged from the bottom of the shaft, and it would have been pretty crowded for them to pass each other in there. Jordan reaches the surface, and he and Dan go to the exit, where a winery employee shows Jordan how to slice the cork off. It's pretty straightforward; holding the bottle nearly horizontal with the cork pointing away from yourself (and, one hopes, anyone else), you slash the saber's blade up along the neck of the bottle towards the cork. Do it hard enough, and the blade takes off not only the cork and the wire, but the whole collar of the bottle. Which is how Jordan does it. The clue that shoots out is inside a little clear plastic tube, and has to be removed and unrolled so they can read "Taittinger La Marquetterie." And that's all it says. I'm liking how the clues this week are actual clues and not little printed letters saying "go here." Phil says they'll now need to figure out (and actual "figuring out" will happen, unlike so many other occasions when this phrase is used) that this is a chateau in the nearby village of Pierry, and it's where they'll find their clue. The bothers are on their way. "There were millions of bottles down there," Jordan claims. Well, definitely thousands, at least, and maybe even tens of thousands. It's not like we ever get to see the whole cellar at once. Louie is now searching among them while Steve begins his descent.
Driving through Reims, Brent and Caite have found a square and a statue, but it's the wrong one of both. That doesn't stop them from getting out for a closer examination. Caite thinks it's the right statue because of the animals, which is the first sign that this is going to be another stellar endorsement for public education in the Carolinas. Brent thinks the female figure to one side is Joan of Arc. "Joan of Arc was a guy," Caite points out condescendingly. Brent disagrees, pointing out that her name is, after all, Joan. "Okay, never mind, just kidding, thinking of somebody else," Caite mutters unconvincingly. Which is much less attractive than Jordan laughing at herself for the same mistake. Moments like this is why I don't often rely on cheap references to her famous rhetorical faceplant during her pageant; it turns out I don't need to. When they reach the statue's plinth, Caite observes, "I don't hear anything. I don't think this is right." I guess I have to give her credit for being right about being wrong.
Louie finds his bottle, and nearly trips starting up the stairs. Behind him, Steve reaches the bottles and starts chanting at them, "You are here, here, here, bad, bad, bad," whatever that means. Louie reaches the surface, out of breath from the equivalent of ten flights of stairs, and gets handed his bottle and saber. He slashes the top off, spattering the camera lens, and now the screen has drops of liquid on it as well as the subtitle that they're currently in second place. If they could get the former to spell out the latter, that would be awesome. Louie has a little trouble getting his "sausage fingers," as Michael calls them, into the tube to remove the clue. He gets it eventually, though.
Jordan and Jeff are in Reims. That is all for now.
Brent and Caite are wondering about their move. Brent suggests asking some people, and Caite sighs, "No." So Brent sticks the clue in her hand and says, "Here, you seem to have one of those attitudes right now." That commences a whole argument about which of them actually has attitude, which is always a good sign that only one person is guilty of it. They go into a bank to ask directions and the teller is able to point to the cathedral spires that are visible a few blocks away. But even this doesn't make peace between them, as they get back into the car and start arguing about whether he moved his seat back to crowd her while she sits in back. You know, a big part of the problem with the "family edition" is that nobody wanted to see children running the Amazing Race. That's still the case.
Steve continues his search, which he unsurprisingly describes as "Not as much fun as drinking it." He makes his find, and then gets the bottle open on the second slash. They're off in third place.
The arriving Carol and Brandy spot Steve and Allie coming back up the narrow street. After they get to he winery and open their clue in fourth place, Carol tells Brandy, "Go ahead." Annoyed, Brandy reads the clue and says, "Somehow I get all the height things." But this is a depth thing! Totally opposite! Carol tries to convince her she'll have fun as she's lowered complaining into the hole. Up top, Carol optimistically tells us, "Hopefully she finds it quickly and gets back up the stairs and hopefully she's not in a piss-ass mood when she comes back up here." Well, anything's possible. Brandy actually is in a decent mood when she and her tandem guide alight down below, and she begins her search.
Dan and Jordan find a travel agency and ask the attractive young brunette behind the counter to show them on their tourist map where to go. Michael and Louie are doing the same thing, but at a hotel. The concierge or whatever tells them it's in Pierry. More specifically, "Pierry, Pierry, Pierry." Let's hope that the Detectives go to the right one of the three. Meanwhile, the brothers' helper is sending them back to Reims. Uh-oh. Michael and Louie actually get a guy to agree to lead them to the right place, which of course falls right into their ever-expanding skill set. "We are police officers, we are professional car followers," Louie says as Michael pulls out behind their new benefactor's Porsche. The brothers are also leaving, happy with their directions and the cutie who provided them. "I think if you find a good-looking person who can give you directions it just doesn't hurt," Jordan says, apparently in all seriousness. I say it's better to ask an ugly person, because they're more likely to have to have gotten to other places themselves rather than having smitten admirers drive them there.
Brent and Caite have found the right cathedral, and get their clue from the saw lady. Unfortunately, theirs doesn't say, "Break up immediately."
Using her headlamp in the gloom of the catacombs, Brandy finds a marked bottle. Up on the surface, after she slashes her bottle open, she and Carol get their clue in fourth place.
Steve and Allie ask a guy for directions, and they too are sent back to Reims. But Carol and Brandy are getting directions to Pierry, so it's a good week to be a lesbian or a detective. If there were a team of lesbian detectives, they would get the million dollars right now. Jet and Cord reach Leclerc Briant in fifth place. "I wonder if everybody's been here and gone," Jet says, when in fact they're only in fifth place. This being another rope task, Cord is going, telling us he doesn't know about rappelling, but is "fixing to find out, I guess." Yes, he'll be an expert after this. He gets lowered down with the bearded guy as Jet settles down to wait up top, to a table with four slashed-off champagne bottles lined up on it. Dude, between those deadly weapons waiting to impale the face of anyone who trips and the gaping, hundred-foot-deep mineshaft in the middle of the floor, this is becoming the most dangerous workplace ever. "We have not had a very good morning," Jet understates. He quickly counts the bottles, does a little math, and realizes they're in fifth place. "That's not good, we started out in third," he grimaces. I'd argue that losing only two spots after going to the wrong city is better than they deserve. Unless of course you take intro account which teams are still behind them. Down below, Cord reaches the end of the cord and begins his search. I'm hoping Jet gets more chances to do roadblocks that have to do with airplanes, black stone, and magazines aimed at the African-American community.
Jordan and Jeff find the saw player and get their clue in last place. The saw player seems to wonder whether she's supposed to keep playing, now that there aren't going to be any more teams coming to see her. My position is that any reason for someone to stop playing a saw is a good one.
Cord finds his bottle, and when he gets upstairs he slashes the top off while pointing it right at the camera. I hope that was the cameraman's idea. They thank the guide, then run across the street to ask a French chick with a pixie cut where to go . Reims, she says. Uh-oh, we say.
Michael and Louie are reaching the destination. "We're following a nice Frenchman in a Porsche, through France. It doesn't get any better than this." Even driving the Porsche? They are led right to the clue box out front. After hugs for their guides, they open the clue. Unsurprisingly, it's a Detour.
"From cultivating the perfect grape to cultivating the perfect presentation," Phil says as he walks through a vineyard, "The work associated with champagne is both exhausting and exacting." So that work is now a choice between "Tower" and "Terra." For "Tower," the teams will have to use exactly 680 glasses to build a fifteen-level pyramid of champagne glasses, with one glass on top. "If they can solve that equation, and build a tower without breaking any glasses, they can fill it with champagne and receive their clue." Yeah, I don't think anybody's going to be solving any "equations." I couldn't even figure it out myself without building an Excel spreadsheet, never mind during the race. Fortunately for them it's not geometry that's going to make or break anyone, but we're getting ahead of ourselves. For "Terra," they have to search a square kilometer of "barren, wintry land for a tiny cluster of grapes marked with race colors." Namely, another one of those tiny flags. They must have had some left over after cutting up an 8½ x 11 sheet of office paper for them. Then they'll bring it to the harvest foreman to swap for their clue. Michael and Louie agree to search, on the logic that they are bulls in china shops. They go through the gate to the vineyard, and see a very daunting landscape spread out on the entire hillside below them. "You gotta be kidding me," Michael says. They begin their search, torn between the need to hurry and the desire not to miss anything.
The subtitle on the screen reads "Reims," which I now begin to suspect is French for "Wrong." There's a big white compound building with "Taittinger" painted on the outside wall in big black letters, and Dan and Jordan run inside and find an employee who tells them the place they're looking for is not in Reims, but Pierry. She clarifies that they're at Taittinger, "where we do the champagne," but Marquetterie means mansion or castle. "How did we mess that up?" one of them wonders as they jog back to their car. Back underway, Jordan pronounces, "The lesson in this leg of the race was don't always trust a pretty girl." CBS Cares.
Speaking of girls who are pretty but should probably not be listened to, Brent and Caite have arrived at Leclerc Briant, and Brent is taking this one. Down he goes. He likes it so much that when he gets to the bottom he almost smiles.
Jordan and Jeff giggle as they pass by an avant-garde underwear store window display. Welcome to pastoral France!
Brent seems to find his bottle quickly, so they're off in sixth place. "Unfortunately, we did not get to drink any champagne," Caite says in the car. That is unfortunate. They might have mellowed out a bit.
Louie's getting so desperate in his search that he's ready to try turning in a clump of red and yellow grapes, sans flag. Michael says that doesn't count. Louie resumes the search with a prayer to Saint Anthony. God is like, "Oh My Me, finally someone else gets called on around here."
Jordan and Jeff reach Leclerc Briant in last place, and she's laughing like a loon as Jeff realizes he's taking this one to because of her fear of small, dark places. I don't think there's actually anything intrinsically funny going on; it's just the kind of exhausted hysterics that can hit you when you're tired from traveling, like the time we were in Arizona and I laughed for ten minutes straight because I heard someone say, "Yeah, dude." Hilarious. "Hopefully I get rabies in there," Jeff jokes, milking it. Getting into his harness, he admits he's scared. "I'm not pretending like I'm cool about it or anything," he says coolly. He gets lowered down with the bearded guy, whom he remarks looks like Santa Claus. The soundtrack responds with a sleigh-bell effect. Jordan says they haven't seen anybody, "But you never know. Other teams could get lost or something."
Speaking of which, Steve and Allie have just found the same wrong Taittinger that Dan and Jordan went to earlier. The camera lurches as Steve pulls around into a parking spot, in that way that never looks like a big deal on TV but which always signals some form of fender-bender. When they get out, the right front bumper is badly bashed in, with the turn signal mangled clear out of existence. "We're gonna have to fix that," Steve says, then hurries on inside. Where they are almost immediately greeted with a French-accented, "It's not here." The same lady directs them to Pierry, which they now have to drive to in a busted-up ride. "Oh, man, you screwed the car up big time," Allie remarks as they return to the car. They get back on the road, and it's clear from a noise that's audible inside the car that something is rubbing against a wheel or something. Steve pulls over by the side of the road, and tries to pull away the inner layer of the fender from where the wheel is scraping it. He suggests Allie move the car a bit while he's holding onto it. "You want me to pull forward while your hand is right there?" Allie confirms incredulously. That's even dumber than Arc of Triomphe.
Jeff finds his bottle. Outside the door, with six champagne corks from the teams lined up on a low garden wall, he cuts off his own, and then steals a drink like a kid with a garden hose before pouring the rest out on the pavement. They're off in last place, but at least one racer actually got to taste some champagne today. Assuming that isn't just Canada Dry in there, of course.
Steve is still trying to bend the fender away from the wheel, but getting nowhere. Allie thinks they need a new car. That's enough to trigger a commercial break, even if Maria and Tiffany learned last season that wrecking your car isn't nearly the catastrophe it used to be.
After the ads, Steve's still trying to rip the piece free with brute force. He suddenly remembers there's duct tape in his bag, and she digs out a small roll. Somehow he gets the piece taped back in something approximating "place," and as they drive off with a newly quiet wheel, Steve tells us, "Duct tape. My wife, before we left, threw it in there, says you can fix anything with duct tape. Well, honey, we'll see." Yes, the merits of duct tape have been debated for generations, but I always thought husbands and wives were on opposite sides of the divide than Steve and Mrs. Steve. At least in our house, Trash has doubts about my theory that if it can't be done with duct tape, it can't be done.
Brent and Caite are trying to get directions to Taittinger, and are getting nowhere. But Jordan and Jeff are at the Office de Tourisme (a different one, because apparently there are a lot of them) and getting sent to Reims. That's it, they're done. They just don't know it yet.
Back at the correct Taittinger, Louie is saying that they'll continue their grid search after they reach the end of the row they're on. "Oh, I don't think we're going to have to continue for long, my brother," Michael says cheerfully. "Eagle-Eye Mike found the grapes, baby." He detaches them from a post and kisses them, and as they walk back to the winery, he boasts, "If I can find crack in someone's rear end, I can find grapes in a vineyard." I hope he doesn't kiss that too. They bring them to the harvest foreman as instructed in the clue, and are in first place as Phil says, "Teams must now make their way across the city to L'Orcaa, the cultural administration for Champagne, France." Whatever that means. It's the Pit Stop, in any case. The last team to check in maybe eliminated, but it's looking like Michael and Louie are about to win their third leg in a row. Don't call it a comeback; they weren't here to begin with at the start of the race.
Jet and Cord are the latest team to reach the wrong Taittinger, and get told to go to Pierry instead. In their post-leg interview, they're looking at the bright side: "People pay thousands of dollars to get a tour that we had today," Cord says. "No. We did it for free. We had a Mercedes." "And all day," Jet adds. Back in the car, Cord says, "Second time today we went to he wrong town. So...getting used to it." Just the mild way he says that is hilarious.
Dan and Jordan have reached the right Taittinger in second place. They're doing Tower. They go into a warehouse where a string quartet is playing and begin unboxing champagne glasses. "I personally believe that when you have a luck challenge and a skill challenge you always pick the skill," Jordan says as he begins lining up the glasses. He certainly has every right to believe that. "I think we have seen a couple of champagne towers in our day at bar- and bat-mitzvahs that we've been to," he adds. Seeing and doing are two different things, though. Which is why the race has stopped staging "challenges" like riding in cars.
Carol and Brandy reach the right Taittinger the first time, in third place, and choose Terra. "We just have to pick some grapes?" Carol says. Of course, when they get a load of the acres of vineyard staring back at them, it's a different story. "I mean, there's very few grapes, I supposed that's the good news," Carol says. She's getting really good at coming up with reasons for Brandy not to lose her shit.
Michael and Louie pull up outside L'Orrca. They're so happy to see Phil that even the man standing to him, a cadaverous-looking mime holding a sign reading "Welcome to Champagne-Ardenne," can't dampen their spirits. He bows to them, and apparently the mime thing is catching, because Phil just pops an eyebrow at them and raises one finger. They're beyond thrilled to have won yet another leg, especially when they learn that they've finally won one of those trips rather than TVs and gift cards. Enjoy Cancun, Detectives. Michael interviews that Europe has been fun. "I wish I had this attitude in South America, maybe we would have did better in the first couple legs. But we're feeling good now." Good that their trip is to another Spanish-speaking country, then.
Caite is out on foot, asking people where Taittinger La Marquetterie is while Brent follows along in the car. Nobody seems to know. Or word has gotten out that there are swarms of Americans shuttling between Taittingers today and they don't want to add to the confusion.
Carol spots a flagged bunch of grapes two rows over, and sends Brandy around to get it. "You have the best eyes ever," Brandy says. They're pretty happy, and they get their clue in second place. "I would like some champagne, please," one of them says in French. Driving off the grounds, Brandy muses, "I wonder if the children are happier here because they grew up around people drinking champagne." I suspect the children are happier because they drink champagne themselves.
Jordan and Dan's pyramid is making good progress, although theirs has a square base rather than the triangular one in the demo. This is problematic for a couple of reasons. One, they're going to end up with the wrong number of glasses. Two, they're failing to take advantage of the inherent stability of triangles, which is an engineering concept so basic that it's pretty much the only one I know. And third, three champagne glasses up against each other have a narrower gap between them than four champagne glasses against each other do, allowing for more stable staking of the level. Behold, my three-point argument! Triangles FTW! Jordan wants to move with the beat of the music, which Dan wisely has no time for. "It makes me nervous," he says. Jordan thinks their progress is being mirrored by the music. The world where Jordan lives must be a nice place to be.
Steve and Allie find the right Taittinger on the second try, and opt for Terra. "Hopefully these grapes pop out at me like that curb did," Steve says. Just what he needs, a bashed-up shin.
Carol and Brandy pull over to ask a policeman for directions to L'Orrca. Brent and Caite, who have still been trying to get directions to Taittinger, also decide to ask a policeman. It's the same one Brandy is talking to, so they instead of going ahead and asking, they just decide to follow the other team as they pull out. "Yes, we caught up to the lesbians," Caite says. "We're awesome!" Brent agrees. Both statements are equally correct. Carol and Brandy run down the hill behind L'Orrca to the mat, and Phil, seeing Miss Team USA approaching behind them, invites them to "Come on in, guys." As they do, Brent realizes, "We didn't do the Detour." The mime pops his eyebrows eloquently at them, as they realize they have to get back to the race. In mime, it's the equivalent of "You guys are even stupider than someone who chooses a profession that everyone hates." "We've done that twice now!" Brent realizes as they run back to their car. "Damn, I wanna get the stupid lesbians out. I hate them," Caite whines. That's so much less mean than their joke about her wearing a tiara.
Carol and Brandy are reading the mime's greeting. "And in the spirit of the mime," Phil says, "I will say that you are team number..." and he holds up two fingers. They're jubilant at their highest ranking yet. "I have welcomed some very strong all-female teams to the mat in the past," Phil says, and asks if they're going to win. No pressure or anything. Brandy doesn't want to jinx it, but yes, she thinks they're going to win. Good thing she didn't jinx it.
Steve finds a flagged grape cluster. "If we could read maps, we could kick ass," he says. Handing their grapes to the foreman, he jokingly asks, "Are you a mechanic?" No, but he has their clue, and they're on their way, even if they're not going to score another second-place finish this time.
Jordan and Jeff are the last team to reach the wrong Taittinger, and find out they need to be in Pierry. "Jeff, what are the chances, jeez," Jordan says as she gets in the back seat so he can drive.
Turns out the chances are exactly four in seven, because Brent and Caite have somehow reached the right place on the first try, making them one of only three teams to do so. Brent makes the case that they should do the search, lest the glasses fall and break. We get a glimpse of the brothers, whose pyramid of glasses is now ten levels high. Caite goes along with it, but doesn't hesitate to complain about it to her cameraman while Brent searches off in the distance. "I think looking for something in about two acres is absolutely stupid," she carps. Not to nitpick, and this isn't something I knew myself without looking it up, but the area they're searching is not two acres. Its 247.acres. So cheer up, Caite!
Dan and Jordan's pyramid now comes to a point at one glass up top, but it's only twelve levels high. Jordan says there's not a way to make a perfect pyramid with the number of glasses they have. "We're missing the way," Dan insists, correctly. Jordan suggests building the last three levels by sticking the last three directly on top of each other. Sounds precarious, but in the world where Jordan lives, anything is possible. "Ugh, here we go," Dan says doubtfully.
Jet and Cord reach the winery, and opt for looking for grapes. "I got a shaky hand," Cord interviews. They and Miss Team USA spot each other in the field, at a distance where the only way one team could identify the other would be if one of them were wearing incongruously gigantic cowboy hats.
Steve and Allie reach the mat in third place. They hug, and Steve tells Phil, "I have a car out there that I hope you guys insured." Phil looks a little worried and Allie grimaces nervously. They look like a couple of siblings telling their dad they crashed the car, and Phil? Looks a bit like the dad.
Jet and Cord find a cluster of grapes with a flag on it. Seeing this, Caite agitates to switch tasks. Actually, she harps, "Do you wanna build, or you wanna look? Answer my question!" As if what Brent wants is relevant. Jet and Cord get their clue in fourth place to the familiar strains of the Heroic Cowboy Theme. The other teams must be so damn sick of hearing that thing by now.
Dana and Jordan are finishing their Hail-Mary stack. "Pour it," Dan announces, stepping back with has hands spread before he can knock over the whole fragile megillah with a stray gesture, or a misdirected breath, or a heavy thought (which is a danger Brent and Caite do not face, as we see them descend into even more childish bickering). A host pops the cork on a giant bottle of champagne that Dan's going to have to pour, which he claims in an interview weighs sixty pounds. Maybe if you count the bubbles. "God, why couldn't I be six-two?" Dan carps as he paces around the tower with the mega-magnum. Apparently someone finds him a step-stool, and Jordan holds Dan's hips while Dan pours. So far so good. I actually can't believe this is working. It's like for a brief, shining moment, we're all in Jordan's world.
Caite tells Brent she thinks they should build. "All right, I'm gonna listen to you," he says. They enter while Dan is still pouring, and Caite tells Brent to hand her the glasses and she'll line them up, getting pretty snippy when he tries to help. "I might as well let you build this by yourself," he bitches. "You're Miss Perfect. "I know, that's why you date me," she says. I don't think either of them is being sincere. Oh, and they're going with the square-based pyramid as well.
Jet and Cord check in as team number four. "It's a scary day," Cord says. Indeed. But I'm going on record right now that none of the three teams that failed to beat them to the mat after they drove to the wrong city twice in one leg has a chance in hell of winning the million dollars. Feel free to come back in three weeks.
Dan's pouring continues. "It looks cool," Jordan says. It does indeed. Once the bottle is empty and most of the glasses are full, they get their clue, in fifth place. "I have a feeling Dano and I are gonna get some calls from bar- and bat-mitzvahs around the world, asking us to build a champagne tower for them and we want people to know that we're available for that." "But we're every expensive," Dan points out, which I think is his way of telling Jordan right now, "Please stop talking." Something tells me he's developed a whole repertoire over the years. They take the time to toast before heading off. As they leave the warehouse, finally in a hurry, Brent whispers, "If we would have found that stupid grape..." Too bad for Brent and Caite this isn't The Amazing Second-Guess And Finger-Point. As they continue building, we hear Brent say, "From now on, I'm just gonna listen to every single word Caite says. I think we probably would have found a set of grapes by now, but I would have had my ear chewed off also for the last hour and twenty minutes." What a shame that she doesn't share Brent's maturity and verbal restraint.
Jordan and Jeff are at least in the right town now. Although they seem to be just sitting there parked, waiting for the clue to be dropped into their laps.
Brent and Caite are trying to get their last glass in place, and Brent warns that it won't hold. It does slip into one of those wide, foursquare gaps, but they catch it before any damage is done. I told you!" Brent bitches at her. And then he has the nerve to interview, "You have to have patience to date Caite, because she'll wear you thin sometimes," while she grins up at him adoringly instead of mirroring his sentiment. Now that they're done building, it's time to start pouring. Caite warns him not to pour too fast. He's keeping it to a careful trickle when the top glass topples, triggering a spreading cascade of falling glass that takes out an entire side of their pyramid. Which also looks cool, but not in a way they wanted to see.
After the break, we get to see it again, and Brent interviews, "It was like my heart hitting the floor." He decides they're looking for grapes now. "Calm down, we did our best," Caite tells him as they head out into the vineyard in the fading light. Oh, man, this isn't something you want to be doing after sunset.
Jordan and Jeff arrive outside and are thrilled to see one other car still there. "It's a race to the finish!" Jeff declares. It's a race for last, is what it is. I don't believe the Think Tank alliance is much longer for this race. They take a look through the gates at Terra, but seeing another team out there, Jeff thinks they should try the other task, on some kind of shaky, half-thought-out, Big Brother logic. They start building the glass pyramid, even though. Jordan's never seen one before.
Dan and he-Jordan reach the mat as team number five. Dan does not look thrilled as they high-ten. And who could blame him, after being in first place for any number of minutes?
Caite is philosophical as she and Brent trudge through the vineyard: "We came in here without a million dollars, doing perfectly fine, we can leave without a million dollars." Brent is less philosophical: "Can you walk a little bit faster?"
Building the tower, Jeff is confident they can catch up to the other team. Jordan says, "Yeah." Out in the vineyard, Caite finds a flagged grape bunch, and even this doesn't make Brent happy. "We should have stayed with this!" he yells at her. She starts apologizing. Meanwhile, Jeff is telling Jordan, "It doesn't have to be perfect... we just have to get up high." That theory's about to be tested. Caite continues apologizing as Brent starts detaching the grape bunch from the post.
Jeff tips a glass, and they have a corner-wise breakdown of their own. They stand there thinking on this for a minute, rubbing their slack faces. I mean, this isn't exactly something you can easily start over on, unless you don't care about losing a finger. Meanwhile, outside, Caite and Brent are getting their clue in sixth place. She continues to apologize in the car and they exchange I love yous. All better, then.
It's just about sunset as Team BB11 walks the field, Jeff saying they should "get this done with the least aggravation." Speaking of aggravation, Brent and Caite are arriving at L'Orrca. "Pick a number," Phil invites them. Brent hopes for lucky number six. Phil holds up the fingers of one gloved hand and the thumb of the other, which are hard to see against his black coat. "Fi--six? okay," Caite says. Even Phil cackles at her for that. In a post-leg interview, Caite says through gritted teeth, "I want to win this thing and it's really annoying me and I do not want to be last any maah! Dammit!" Thank you, Cartman.
Jordan and Jeff are now using flashlights as darkness falls on the vineyard. "I feel like a yo-yo, don't you?" Jeff asks her, as if this is the first time for him, and not her default state. Their search continues well into darkness as Jeff wonders, "What are we doing this for, to teach kids to stay in school?" Hee. After an indeterminate amount of time, during which Jeff walks right past one, Jordan finds their teeny little flag. As they get in the car, this time with Jordan driving, Jeff wonders, "How pissed do you think Phil is?" "We're headed to the Pit Stop to talk to Phil," Jordan says nervously as though Jeff is being serious.
The mime looks downright mournful as Jordan and Jeff finally arrive. "You are the last team to arrive," Phil tells them. "What?" Jeff says in deadpan mock-surprise. This time they've been eliminated for real. Believe it or not, I'm kind of sorry to see them go; Jeff at least has turned out to have a self-deprecating sense of humor. "But maybe now you guys will get some time alone," Phil bright-sides. Jeff says, "To be together 24/7 in any relationship is a struggle. We've been through the worst, I feel like." The being together 24/7? How romantic. He interviews, "I got one million reasons to complain, but I can't. Doing this is priceless. I definitely got paid in a way that most people don't." And what does Jordan have to say? "I got to do fun stuff, I've never traveled before, it really was just the best." "That was beautiful, Jordan," Jeff teases, wiping away a tear. Well, he clearly isn't dating her for her eloquence.
M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter, or just e-mail him at M.Giant[at]gmail.com