Bio
Joel Van Der Loon is a world-class survivalist, primitive skills instructor, and television survival competitor best known from Alone Season 7 and Alone: The Skills Challenge on The HISTORY Channel. A longtime Oregon resident based in Sisters, Joel brings a rare combination of real-world wilderness experience, ancestral skills, and calm, grounded leadership to the Survival Games.
Joel’s connection to bushcraft began early, growing up in South Africa and living off-grid in Tanzania, East Africa. That upbringing shaped his lifelong pursuit of traditional survival skills, nature awareness, self-reliance, and a deeper relationship with the wild. Through his Primal Skills Academy, Joel has taught everyone from first-time students and families to firefighters, military personnel, and special operations groups.
At the Survival Games, Joel is more than a recognizable face from television. He is a mentor, teacher, and steady presence for competitors as they step into unfamiliar challenges, test their instincts, and learn what they are capable of under pressure. His approach blends practical survival knowledge with humility, patience, adaptability, and respect for the natural world.
As host and instructor, Joel helps bring the spirit of the Survival Games to life, turning each challenge into something bigger than competition. Competitors will not just watch a survival expert from TV, they will learn directly from one.