'Below Deck Adventure's chief stewardess Faye Clarke breaks down what's different about Bravo's latest nautical offering.
Below Deck Adventure is here to up the stakes.
"We needed a little bit of a change," chief stewardess Faye Clarke tells ET of the new Below Deck offshoot. "We've seen the Mediterranean, we've seen the Caribbean. I think Below Deck Adventure is going to bring the audience something that they have never seen before. Like, they will see accidents happen, and they will see people get nervous and they will see people coming out of their comfort zones, you know?"
"Stuff really happens that could actually injure people," she teases. "I am not going to say too much, but I wouldn't have signed up for any other Below Deck."
Below Deck Adventure takes charter guests to the waters of Norway, where the outings are less about relaxing and more about getting an adrenaline rush: think mountain repelling, hang gliding and river rapid explorations.
"The type of charter guests that want to travel all the way to Norway, they want something different," Faye explains. "They don't want the average day, where they are just sipping rosè on a beach; they want to come away with an experience. They wanna be scared at some point."
Operating adventure-based charters was new territory for the U.K.-based stew, but being a thrill seeker herself, Faye jumped at the chance to plan over-the-top excursions. "I wanted [the guests] to stand at the top of the cliff, or whatever, and think, 'Am I going to do this today?!'" she shares. "I wanted them to be proud of themselves and I wanted them to go away and think that was an awesome holiday."
When she's not working on boats, Faye says she spends her time working her other jobs (makeup artist and chef), or seeking out adventures of her own. She's more likely to go backpacking than sit down and watch TV, meaning she wasn't exactly a fan of the franchise before signing up for Below Deck Adventure.
"Obviously I'd heard of Below Deck, and all the yachting industry either love it or hate it," she notes. "I've watched a few and I was like, 'Oh my god...'"
That OMG reaction came from watching season 2 of Below Deck Sailing Yacht, which Faye checked out because she knew one of the stars: Jean-Luc Cerza Lanaux.
"I worked on a yacht in Fort Lauderdale and there was a young guy, I think he's, like, 22," she explains. "I think about six months after we departed and went our separate ways, I found out he was on Below Deck, so I watched that and I saw some of the things he was doing I was like, 'Ohhh...'"
Jean-Luc made tabloid headlines for a hookup with stewardess Dani Soares, which resulted in a child -- baby Lilly Rose -- whom Jean-Luc largely refused to take responsibility for until a paternity test proved he was her father.
"I'm about to join him next week on a new yacht," Faye adds, "so we're going to be working back together, me and Jean-Luc ... pure coincidence, but I think the one thing that really pushed me to apply to have my journey on yachts filmed was, I had an owner on a yacht that was obsessed with Below Deck. From morning to night, when we were setting up his breakfast, his lunch, Below Deck was on and he always used to say to us, 'Would you do this?' and, 'You should do it...' and ... I was like, why not?"
"I mean, my whole life, people have said to me, 'You are so entertaining,' and I am like, why?" she continues. "I am just me, and it's kind of worrying, I don't know... but it takes all sorts of characters to make the world go around I suppose!"
Those characters include some ladies from Bravo's The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City. Heather Gay and Angie Harrington pop up as guests this season (and Angie, in the interview above, thanks to a pre-taped message for Faye).
"They just say what they think, they are used to having people around them," Faye says of the RHOSLC stars. " I can honestly say every charter guest that we had has stayed in contact with me, and they are all just genuinely lovely people. Like, lovely people. You might see something different on camera - I don't know -- but to my face, they were lovely."
Not being a reality TV fan, Faye had no clue Heather and Angie were "somebodies" when they stepped aboard the yacht.
"That is the best way, because when you know somebody famous is getting on, or something like that, you act differently," she says, "and I don't want to act differently. I want to be myself. So, in a way that was good."
While Faye says there were no "charter guests from hell" on Below Deck Adventure's debut season, there was one hellish aspect to the experience.
"In Norway, what everyone needs to understand, is that the sun doesn't go down," she notes. "So I was working probably from 7 o'clock in the morning sometimes 'til 4 o'clock in the morning the next day because people forgot to go to bed, because it was always daylight, and they just carried on going and going and going and I was like, 'Huh... how many drinks and food can these people consume?' So that was the biggest challenge."
Thinking ahead to what viewers are going to watch, Faye says she's really only concerned about seeing "the state of me" play out onscreen.
"I was so tired," she admits, "and I don't know what hair and makeup I was doing every morning. I didn't have hot water for maybe six weeks, so showering was just a nightmare for me."
There's also the whole boat-mance thing teased in the trailer for the season.
"I think that is something that the audience are going to want to see unravel, I suppose," she teases. "I am not saying anything."
Below Deck Adventure airs Tuesdays on Bravo, starting with its series premiere on Nov. 1 at 9 p.m. ET/PT. Check out the trailer below.
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