Exclusive Interview
‘Survivor 50’: How Savannah & Her Boyfriend Prepared for Separation After Quick Reunion
What To Know
- After winning Survivor 49, Savannah Louie had only nine days at home with her partner, Brandon Stiles, before returning to Fiji to compete in Survivor 50.
- Savannah reveals how she and Brandon spent those nine days together to prepare for another separation.
- Savannah was eliminated from Survivor 50 in Episode 2, the third boot of the season overall.
Savannah Louie won Survivor 49, was invited to play in Survivor 50 the next day, and then was back on set in Fiji nine days later. In between, she went home to Georgia in the small window of time to get some much-needed R&R, albeit it was a very brief stint. She’s been open on social media about how she and her partner, Brandon Stiles, prepared to separate again so soon after her time on Season 49. Following her Survivor 50 elimination, we asked for more details on that nine-day reunion.
Savannah and Brandon started dating in May 2024. They had been dating for about one year when she started getting ready to film Season 49. In a TikTok shared in January 2026, the Atlanta news broadcaster revealed the love letters she wrote for Brandon to read while she was in Fiji and completely disconnected from the real world. She wrote over 30 letters, and some of them included gifts (see the video below).
We asked Savannah how much time she spent in those nine days between Seasons 49 and 50 prepping for the game and soaking up time with her partner. She admitted it was a “hard” process.
@sahhvz I surprised my boyfriend with a love letter for every day I was gonna be gone playing Survivor🥲 part of my preparation for the show! #survivor #cbssurvivor #survivor50 #survivor49 #loveletter ♬ original sound – sahhvz
“It was honestly so hard, those nine days,” Savannah tells us. “It’s a balance of, OK, I want to spend time with my people, but I also need to take care of myself. I need to get the massages. I need to go see the therapist a few times. There’s so much that I felt like I needed to do in that tiny span of time.”
“A lot of the things that I would do, I would try to do with my partner, or I would try to FaceTime my mom as much as possible,” she continues. “I think a big part of recovering from Survivor is obviously the physical stuff, but also filling your cup again with people who you love and people who you genuinely trust and who are always going to have your best interests at heart, versus a bunch of strangers who are competing against you for $1 million. So it was a little mix of both, but oh my God, it was hard. I’m not going to lie.”
Savannah ended up only lasting six days on Survivor 50. She was voted out in a move orchestrated by Cirie Fields, who — to protect her No. 1 ally, Ozzy Lusth — argued to the Cila tribe that Savannah was a good option for the second Tribal Council elimination because she was a former winner. Plus, no one had seen Season 49 by the time they filmed 50, so her skills were unknown, and she concealed an advantage she won in a contest against Colby Donaldson.
Her Survivor journey is over (for now), but she still has a deep love for the game.
Survivor, Wednesdays, 8/7c, CBS
