Barrie 'Swampy’ Ridley from Queenborough beat 80,000 people to make it on to the hit Channel 4 show Shipwrecked as part of the Shark tribe.In this weekly column, he shares his experiences

As Shipwrecked begins to draw to a close, the episodes are becoming more and more emotional and last week’s show was no exception.

The episode focused on the two tribes receiving letters from home – after almost three months with no contact to the outside world at all.

Everyone took turns to read their letters, and there were tears from almost everyone when they heard various bits of good news from England.

Barrie said: “It was so emotional and it brought camp moral back up and made everyone happy.

“It was nice to watch it as it brought back so many memories – it was one of the best days on the show.”

Also in the episode, the new arrivals, twins Rebecca and Sarah, had to make their decision on which island they would live.

Before they announced their decision Barrie told us the twins had told both the tribes that whichever island they pick must choose Rebecca to stay – they chose Tiger island.

Barrie said: “Sarah is the stronger one and she wanted Rebecca to get a bit of independence and thought that she would get more from it. “But she’s not happy on Tiger island for long and next week she nominates to us and we accept her as a Shark.”

The end of Sunday’s episode showed three new arrivals heading towards the islands.

Barrie said: “The three new arrivals came out of the blue and we were wondering do we pick one or two?

“We thought if we won them we would pick one to stay but if the Tigers won they would be able to keep all three to even it up.”

The new arrivals are Nathan, Sarah and Joseph, and after spending equal amounts of time on each island, they chose the Sharks.

The Shark tribe do only have to pick one of them, and they choose Nathan.

Barrie said: “It was a big disappointment to only pick one of them and it was a split decision between Nathan and Sarah – Nathan is a real lad’s lad, and Sarah is really funny.”

Barrie revealed that the final twist of Shipwrecked 2008, is that Nick, the Hawk island survival expert, is the final new arrival.

But this week he tells us it is not just Nick – all the Hawks come back to join the tribes.

Barrie said: “We are in camp when the Hawks come back and we knew something was going on – you get a vibe, and then we heard shouting.

“We saw two boats full of people heading towards the islands and we just know straight away who it is.

“One boat has all the hawk girls on and the other all the hawk boys, one goes to tigers and one goes to sharks.

“We get the girls first and Tigers get boys then we swap and have to impress them as though they are new arrivals.”

The Hawks each have to pick which island they want to live on for the final night, without discussing their choices with each other, and the island with the most people will win Shipwrecked 2008.