Down to his last Tribal and out of numbers, Dale Wentworth sat at camp whittling a stick into something that might pass for a hidden idol, betting an Ephrata farmer's bluff could spook a whole tribe into keeping him. It's the kind of crafty, old-school swing you root for. There's a delicious wrinkle, too: Dale came to San Juan del Sur to play Blood vs. Water alongside his daughter Kelley, years before she'd turn into one of the great idol artists the game ever produced.
The swap that split the pair sank him. Kelley landed on the wrong side of the new tribe and got picked off a round before her dad, leaving Dale to scratch for traction as the obvious outsider. So out came the homemade prop, and nobody bit. Keith Nale fell in with Jon and Jaclyn, the vote landed on Dale, and he was sent home thirteenth. The Wentworth who'd go on to drop one of the most famous idol plays in Survivor history was already on the boat out — and Dale's carved stick fooled exactly no one.
