overnights

Below Deck Sailing Yacht Season-Finale Recap: Docking for the Season

Below Deck Sailing Yacht

All Roads Lead to Gaisy
Season 3 Episode 17
Editor’s Rating 5 stars

Below Deck Sailing Yacht

All Roads Lead to Gaisy
Season 3 Episode 17
Editor’s Rating 5 stars
Photo: Laurent Basset/Bravo

Those cheeky, sneaky, Bravo bastards! I should have known better than to read into their teasing episode title (“All Roads Lead to Gaisy”), which, on second reading, definitely needs some work in the portmanteau department, but I guess I just wanted Gary and Daisy to happen so bad, I was willing to believe anything. For those few seconds in the BAR, I was convinced we were about to witness history. I was even starting to worry! How would the rest of the crew react? Would Daisy regret it? Would their relationship suffer? What would it mean for next season?

Love them or hate them, Gary and Daisy’s will-they-won’t-they dance has us hooked. Just when I think I’m out, they pull me back in. Gary is objectively gross, and yet there’s something about the guy. Even the charter guests are rooting for Gaisy, going so far as to ask Daisy her thoughts on marriage. I wouldn’t be surprised if the bride was up writing fanfic as we speak.

Let’s rewind: Daisy catches the bride’s bouquet and is swept up in the romance of the moment. This happens to the best of us. We go to one wedding and suddenly start seeing in rose-colored glasses. We believe in true love! After she catches it, Gary sprints into the water, declaring that he won’t marry her. He runs back and shrieks at her, asking why she had to catch it. The wedding party fawns over them, and the bride says they’re a cute couple. We get a picture-perfect moment (where is this photo, by the way? I would love to lay my eyes on it!) before Daisy snaps back into reality and says the whole moment is too close for comfort.

Back on board, the guests grill Daisy on Gary and the potential of a relationship. She shuts them down immediately: “No, that’s never going to happen since I’m not an idiot.” Soon enough, the charter is over and our crew ushers the guests off the boat (we’ll get to this after we discuss Gaisy in their entirety) to prepare for their final night of debauchery. As Gary says, let’s be like a donkey’s dick and hit the road!

In one cab, Ashley suggests that Gary will either sleep with Scarlett or Daisy. Sweet Barnaby rejects this outright: “Gary is never going to fuck Daisy,” he says while gesturing how high he thinks of Daisy compared to Gary. Colin chimes in that he wouldn’t put it past Gary, and Barnaby seems shocked and concerned.

At dinner, Gary proposes the group share their highs and lows of the season. Corny, but cute. As a Pisces, I approve of this ‘roses and thorns’ exercise. Gary’s high? “Dais, I’m going to have to say you. Coming up from last season, we’ve just got along like a house on fire, and you and I are closer than ever and it’s meant a lot to me.” Bravo to the Bravo producers once again for this Gaisy montage. They are laying it on thick! (For the record, both my and Colin’s high of the season is the three boys giggling and play fighting in their room. Colin refers to this as ‘The Giggle Club.’) Daisy’s high, meanwhile, is the wedding. With a wistful look in her eye, she says it made her feel like there might be true love out there…

Back in the cabs en route back to the Parsifal, Barnaby gets straight to work, asking Daisy if she’s shagged Gary. She says no. He asks why. “His penis kind of freaks me out,” she replies. That’s as good an answer as any! In the other cab, The Giggle Club plus Scarlett are engaging in a splash fight. This poor driver and his soaked car.

The crew gets back on board and parties, blah blah, we’ll go into this later. More importantly: It’s 2:58 a.m., and Daisy and Gary are the only ones at the bar. “Okay, so for once can me and you, one time in our life… Can we…?” Daisy starts to ask. Gary jumps on this immediately. “Have sex? Where are we meeting? Starboard or port? You tell me.” My jaw is on the floor. There’s no way Daisy actually shags Gary tonight! Gary insists that she at least change out of her wet bikini. She retorts that she knows how to get undressed. I am screaming at this exchange. Gary asks the question we’re all wondering in a confessional: “What the fuck is going on?”

The next shot we see of Daisy shows her bun donut nearly halfway out, so I’m forgiving her for her lapse in judgment here. She’s clearly drunk and feeling sentimental post-wedding and due to the season ending. Gary gets distracted by yet another slap fight with Marcos, and that delay may have just saved Daisy from a Gaisy hookup. Kelsie interrupts their snuggle sesh in their shared room, and what Gary calls a ‘cock block,’ I call a blessing in disguise.

Daisy confides in Kelsie, calling their relationship “complicated” (no shit), and Kelsie asks her if she’s sure she doesn’t want to go with Gary. Daisy responds with a resounding “no,” and that’s that. Colin and Marcos dissuade Gary from going to give her a goodnight kiss, telling our favorite Lothario that he’s doing too much. And … scene.

Now that Gaisy is out of the way, let’s talk about the rest of the episode. The finale gave what a finale should give. It’s feel-good and fun and nothing like the first half of this season, which was chock-full of toxicity and drama. The wedding guests gift the crew a magnum bottle of Veuve Clicquot and some major change (a $20,000 tip), and Captain Glenn unveils the grand total of the season: Over $160,000. Not bad!

As for the wedding cake? Allegra seems fully surprised that Marcos actually made her one, which makes me livid on his behalf. I wish she was chomping at the bit for it, mentioning it at every turn. Did she even want this cake? Allegra and Co. are actually quite polite and fun, but I am overprotective of Marcos! He says he wants to give the guests a show for their wedding dinner, and like clockwork, they eat right out of his palm as he flambés a Tomahawk steak tableside. “Marcos, you’re a showman!” they cry.

Daisy promotes Ashley to “lead stew,” at the tip meeting and Ashley is overcome with emotion. In her confessional, she seems quite moved and proud of herself. I had to laugh when Barnaby asked the question we were all thinking: “What the fuck is a lead stew? It’s a nothing.” Perhaps it’s a fake title, but it’s good enough for Ashley! Even Marcos and Colin tell Ashley that she’s grown over the season, and honestly, I’ll give her credit where it’s due. But a moment of silence for how she absolutely decimated her grilled cheese sandwiches, and also a moment of recognition for Marcos saying, straight up, how disgusting her meal looks and that she has butter on her tits. Imagine cooking so poorly in front of Marcos … I’d never be able to show my face in a kitchen again.

Marcos confesses to Captain Glenn that his business partner just told him that an investor is interested in opening a restaurant with them, which likely means Marcos won’t be joining us in upcoming seasons. His restaurant, Marlou, is located in downtown Los Angeles and it looks like Daisy and Gary have stopped by since its opening.

Captain Glenn wakes up the poor hungover souls bright and early the next morning, and one by one, the crew makes their way off the boat. I’ve always wondered how they decide the departure schedule. Clearly Daisy gets top billing, but are there negotiations for everyone else? I think Scarlett should have been the first to disembark, but ultimately it’s Barnaby who gets booted first. Daisy rushes out to say goodbye to him in a towel, which definitely made his entire experience. Ashley seems oddly reflective and admits she has a lot more growing to do. Marcos cries, admitting that he’s been holding in his emotions and how he feels for the first time that he has a new family. Kelsie says she’s learned that the superyacht industry isn’t for her, Colin makes a beautiful ode to the friendships he’s made and how he’ll cherish them, and then Gary, with a faraway look in his eye, mentions that the sexual tension between him and Daisy is undeniable. Maybe one day…

From the Galley

• Gary, when applying his anti-wrinkle cream, admits it’s not working. Have you tried some good, old-fashioned SPF, babe?

• Marcos sages the kitchen following the last meal and also asks us viewers, “Who’s your daddy?” Once again, my feelings on this are [REDACTED].

• Captain Glenn makes sure none of the champagne from the beach wedding goes to waste by drinking the leftovers with Colin and Kelsie.

Below Deck Sailing Yacht Season-Finale Recap