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Shannon Kulpa, of Eden, is featured on the third season of "Naked and Afraid XL," currently showing on Discovery Channel.

Discovery Channel

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Ogden’s Shannon Kulpa is shown here Friday, April 28. 2017, at the Standard-Examiner building in Ogden. Kulpa, a veteran of the Discovery Channel show “Naked and Afraid” is currently featured on “Naked and Afraid XL.”

SARAH WELLIVER/Standard-Examiner

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OGDEN — Shannon Kulpa doesn’t watch much television.

Until two years ago, the Ogden-area woman had never even heard of “Naked and Afraid,” the reality TV show that just completed its seventh season on Discovery Channel. And yet today she’s intimately acquainted with the concept — having just appeared on “Naked and Afraid” and currently appearing on its supersized spinoff, “Naked and Afraid XL.”

In the spring of 2015, Kulpa was flying back from a six-week vacation in Costa Rica when an episode of “Naked and Afraid” popped up on the in-flight entertainment screens.

Recalls Kulpa: “I immediately thought, ‘I have to be in this show! This is so me! This is so me!’ “

• RELATED: North Ogden native gets ‘Naked and Afraid'

Sure enough, just six months later, Kulpa was in the jungles of Trinidad, completely naked and showing the world that she is — in the words of one of her recent co-stars — “definitely a badass.”

The basic premise of “Naked and Afraid” is that two strangers, a man and a woman, are tasked with surviving a stay in the wilderness for 21 days with little more than their wits to produce the necessary water, food and shelter.

Oh, and did we mention they’re completely naked?

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Kulpa did so well on the most recent season of “Naked and Afraid” that producers asked her back for the third season of “Naked and Afraid XL,” which began airing last Sunday night on Discovery Channel. The second episode in the season is scheduled for 8 p.m. today, April 30, on the cable channel.

Think of “Naked and Afraid XL” as a sort of “Nakeder and Afraider.” Instead of 21 days, participants must endure 40 days in the wilderness. And instead of a man and a woman, it features nine to 12 survivalists — in three-person teams — inserted into the wilds several miles apart. This season’s “XL” was shot in the Amazon.

What on earth would possess someone to agree to the terms of this reality TV show? For Kulpa, it’s the challenge.

“This is, like, the most ultimate challenge you can take on,” she said. “If you can do it, and do it well, it can give you a lot of confidence in any situation. I just wanted to know that if something happens — in a real survival situation — can I take care of my kids?”

Thus far, the answer to that question has been a resounding “yes.” Kulpa survived her 21 days in Trinidad, and while we can’t reveal how she does on “XL,” it’s so-far-so-good after one episode.

Joseph Boyle, an executive producer on both “Naked and Afraid” and “Naked and Afraid XL,” says he’s excited to have Kulpa back on the show.

“Shannon is such a great, amazing woman, and a phenomenal person,” he said. “She did so well (the first time), we were so impressed with her skill set, that we were very lucky she wanted to do that.”

Discovery Channel

Boyle also believes this third season of “Naked and Afraid XL” is one of the toughest survival challenges ever offered.

“I am going to tell you this particular season is one of the most challenging yet,” he said. “And it shows.”

Already, several participants have “tapped out,” or left the show.

Kulpa and her friends held an “XL” viewing party last weekend at Ogden’s Slackwater Pizzeria & Pub. This weekend, they’ll meet at Saddlebag Saloon in Eden.

Kulpa was born just south of Buffalo, New York, and went to college at Tulane University in New Orleans.

She and a roommate got into rock climbing, and they came to Utah on a climbing vacation. Kulpa never went back to school, becoming a climbing bum instead.

Kulpa would later move to California and pick up snowboarding, then return to Utah for the Greatest Snow on Earth. She bought a home in Ogden, but is currently renting it out. Kulpa fell in love with the Ogden Valley, and is now living in Eden with her two children.

A stonemason by trade, Kulpa supplements that income with a little snowplow driving in the winter.

So what do her children — an 8-year-old daughter and a son who is about to turn 14 — think about their naked survivalist mom?

“They love it,” Kulpa says. “They’re definitely proud of me.”

She admits her daughter has had a bit of anxiety over what her mother is doing, and it’s been difficult to be away from her children.

“But I knew if I didn’t do this, I’d regret not taking the challenge,” she said.

Kulpa says the only thing that could have gotten her to leave “XL” filming was her children. Kulpa reached an agreement with producers that they’d give her updates on her children every 10 days. Kulpa had given her son and daughter code words to tell the producers — “goat” if everything was fine at home, and “chicken” if it wasn’t.

“I’d ask the production assistant, ‘What’s the code word?’ And she’d say, ‘Goat. Is that good?’ ” Kulpa recalls. “The one word I didn’t want to hear back was ‘chicken.’ If I heard that word, I was going to tap out that minute.”

For Kulpa, the hardest part about “Naked and Afraid” was the simple act of sleeping at night.

“I heard that the Guinness World Record for sleep deprivation is 11 days,” she said. “In Trinidad, I went 10. Ten days with no sleep.”

Also in Trinidad, Kulpa went from 138 pounds to 121 pounds.

Discovery Channel

Despite the title, the “Naked and Afraid” concept is fairly PG-rated. Certain body bits are pixilated, and even the frequent cursings one imagines would accompany people trying to survive in the wild without clothing are bleeped out.

And once she got her clothes off, Kulpa says that part didn’t bother her at all.

“The act of taking them off was weird,” she said. “But I definitely didn’t feel awkward standing there naked. It wasn’t a big deal.”

Besides, Boyle says, the “Naked” part isn’t what you think it is.

“Here’s the thing,” he said. “The nudity is not about nudity. In survival, the first need is shelter, and the first shelter is the clothes on your back. … Taking away that first layer of shelter was critical.

“Although it also makes for a great title,” he added.

As for the “Afraid” part, Kulpa says you get over that relatively quickly. A better name for the show, she jokes, might be “Naked and Stupid,” or perhaps more like “Naked and Crazy.”

In spite of the jokes, Kulpa says she’d return to the Amazon tomorrow, if she had the chance.

“I would love to go right back where I was with a big can of DEET, a mattress, some cheesecake and beer,” she said.

Indeed, Kulpa is toying with the idea of starting her own business that would allow vacationing customers to dip their toes in the “Naked and Afraid” experience. She’d take them to an exotic location and teach them survival skills — although not as intense as on the TV show — while also giving them a chance to experience surfing and other activities.

SARAH WELLIVER/Standard-Examiner

Working business titles are either “Surf and Survival” or “Camp Tarzana” — which plays off Kulpa’s nickname as a female Tarzan.

She’s approached some of her former “Naked and Afraid” castmates about joining her in the venture.

Boyle says the authenticity of the N&A experience “is the rock on which we’re building this.” Unlike many reality TV shows, there’s no prize money, no first-place victory to be won. It’s just survive. Or don’t.

And yet folks are lining up to participate. Even those, like Kulpa, who’ve already done the 21-day challenge.

“I think you’d be hard-pressed to find a single person who wouldn’t consider coming back,” Boyle said. “The people who do this, they’re looking for something very specific in taking this on. They’re passionate about survival, or about adventure. They all have in common this want to see who they are and what they’re made of, to test their mettle.”

And if they offered another spinoff, like “Naked and Afraid XXL,” would Kulpa be up for testing that mettle a third time?

“I would,” she said. “I guess I’m a glutton for punishment. There’s definitely a high you get by being in the most miserable position of your life.”

It also gives you some much-needed perspective, according to Kulpa.

“To turn a water tap on and get clean water,” she said. “Just having a blanket at night and a bed to sleep on, food in the fridge, and electric lights, makes you appreciate life and what we have.”

Contact Mark Saal at 801-625-4272, or msaal@standard.net. Follow him on Twitter at @Saalman. Friend him on Facebook at facebook.com/MarkSaal.