Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X castaway Paul Wachter was voted off his Takali (Gen X) tribe during Wednesday night's Episode 3 broadcast on CBS.

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Paul, a 52-year-old boat mechanic from Sugarloaf Key, FL, became the third castaway voted out of Season 33 of Survivor on Night 10 at the game's third Tribal Council session.

The Gen X tribe had to vote one of their members off after they lost the game's third Immunity Challenge to the opposing Vanua (Millennials) tribe, resulting in the older tribe's second trip to Tribal Council. Paul said he was "blindsided 150 percent" by his vote-off because he had been anticipating Ciandre "CeCe" Taylor's ouster instead.

In an exclusive interview with Reality TV World on Thursday, Paul talked about his Survivor experience. Below is the first half. Check back with us soon for the concluding portion.

Reality TV World: You said in your final words you were 150% blindsided by your vote-off, could you confirm that was the case? How certain were you that CeCe was going home?

Paul Wachter: Well, all six of us had agreed that CeCe was definitely going home. There wasn't a question about it. And, you know, the two people -- [Bret LaBelle] and [Chris Hammons] -- who started the alliance, who were the leaders of the alliance, although I was made out to be the leader.

I was far from the leader of that alliance. Chris was really in charge of the alliance, and Bret. They had it together. We were all very confident that -- it wasn't even a question, the fact that the girls flopped, well, it's some words (laughs) I'll run through my head for the rest of my life.

Reality TV World: Yes, your big mistake appeared to be telling Jessica Lewis and Sunday Burquest that if the boys formed their own alliance, you'd inform them they're on their own going forward. Jessica took that to mean you were only loyal to the guys in the alliance of six. Did you misspeak at all or did you truly have every intention of sticking with the guys in that pecking order?

Paul Wachter: I thought we were tight enough that they knew that I was talking about much further in the game. You know, obviously nothing close to where we were after the merge. And I thought that when I was saying it, I was talking about us as a whole.

And in hindsight, watching the episode, I said that it would be "the guys," and "guys" to me means the guys -- the boys and the girls -- and that our alliance was a group. Man, we were very tight. There wasn't even a question that this was happening.

The only paranoia that was there was that Jessica was convinced that [David Wright] had an idol and she was right. We all pretty much had an idea that he had it, but other than that, we were still headed forward. We weren't worried at all about it.

Reality TV World: So it sounds like you didn't realize you had messed up in any way after making that comment to Jessica.

Paul Wachter: No!

Reality TV World: You didn't even notice the girls distancing themselves from you or anything like that?

Paul Wachter: Nope, we went swimming after that. Everything was fine. The only people that were scrambling was CeCe. She was scrambling around like anybody would do, and she was out-playing me. I mean, obviously they got together and they formed an alliance that basically cut our throats immediately.

It was just very early in the game to have that happen, and you know, I felt and still feel that it didn't have to go down that way. But, you know, (laughs) it's one of those Survivor scenarios that you look at and you go, "Man, I hope I don't say anything stupid," and I did.

I have no one to blame but myself! I'm the one that stuck my foot in my mouth. Whether they were planning on it or not, I opened the door to vote me out, and they did. They took a shot at it. It just didn't have to go down that way. It was way too early for that, in my opinion.

Reality TV World: Ken McNickle gave you a hard time in last night's episode about talking up a big game but never delivering, especially when it came to fishing and providing for your tribe. Did the editing make your performance look worse than it really was? Did you really catch zero fish, among other Ken accusations?

Paul Wachter: No, none of that [was true]. You didn't see me catching fish, you didn't see Chris catching fish, you didn't see Bret catching fish, but we all did. You know, that was an opportunity for Ken to speak about what he thought. He was, you know, on the bottom!

And again, he was saying things to Jessica that he thought would get him off the bottom. But Ken is a super guy. It looked like we clashed a lot, but we agreed on a lot of things. We worked hard on a lot of things together.

And, you know, the crab pots and stuff that I built and all these other things that we did helped the tribe immensely and got us through some things. Ken, the problem I was having with Ken, was when we tried to get him into the alliance, he just wouldn't talk about the game with us! He wasn't talking to Chris about it.

He wasn't talking to Bret about it. And we were trying to get him to jump in! But it was hard. It was very hard. We're from different worlds. He and I come from completely different worlds. He comes from a show-business world and I don't.

Reality TV World: Did you have any idea or get a feeling that Ken was targeting you? And what about David?

Paul Wachter: I knew that they were going to have to target someone to try to get the target off their back, but I didn't think it was going to be me. But, you know, in hindsight, when you watch the show, (laughs) I have a big personality, and sometimes your mouth gets you in trouble. If anyone was going to get in trouble with a big mouth, it was going to be me. I say what I think and it cost me the game.

Reality TV World: Do you think that's why you came across as the leader? 

Paul Wachter: No, I had an equal personality, especially with Bret. They made me look like the leader of our alliance, and I wasn't. I was definitely part of that strong alliance and, you know, like I said, it's one of those things where there's always that guy on the show you scream at the screen and go, "What are you doing?!" And I was that guy.

I wanted to be there, but it didn't seem like I was doing the right things to -- I was reading people incorrectly, you know? I thought Jessica was a little too paranoid worrying about what was going on and Ken wasn't worried about it at all!

I was trying to get him to -- one of my little things I would always say was, "Dude, someday, we gotta play the game. We gotta worry about this or that." He wasn't worried about David having an idol, so again, when you're playing against people who are handpicked to play the game, you're up against the best and it cost me the game.

Me and my mouth cost me the game. There's not a lot you can say about it when you get voted off the way I got voted off. No one knew it was coming. The guys didn't know it was coming. I surely didn't know it was coming. And the girls, flopped. I can't wait to see what happens next.

Check back with Reality TV World soon for more from our exclusive Survivor interview with Paul.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

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