The Outdoor Adventure Giving you tips, tricks & recommendations to help make adventuring in the Outdoors fun, safe & exciting for you and your kids.
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| Hiking in the Monashees, BC, near Valley of the Moon |
I remember several times on hikes drinking straight from the source: a creek (or even better a spring) without a second thought. We didn’t get sick. But not everyone gets away with that, or better said, not everyone has access to such clean sources of water.
The Problem:
Most of the time out water sources are rivers or lakes that could be polluted with several different kinds of bacteria or parasites that frankly, you don’t want to mess with. Your two common enemies are: Giardia (Beaver Fever) and Cryptosporidium. They exist as cysts and when ingested activate and reproduce causing nasty problems on the trail including diarrhoea, cramps, vomiting and fever. The one benefit is that it takes a couple days for the symptoms to surface (2 to 16 days).
The Solution:
| SteriPen’s Adventurer UV Water Purifier |
So what can you do about it? You’ve got several options from simple boiling all the way to fancy (and more costly) portable UV based devices. Plus everything in between.When Boiling water, it is recommended to keep the water boiling for 5 minutes. This should kill both Giardia and Cryptosporidium. That said, the Canadian Gov’t says that a 1 minute boil should do the trick and take care of other bacteria as well. You already have the stove and the fuel, the big question is, do you want to carry extra fuel and stop for 10 minutes or more to boil water for the trail?
*Inspectapedia has a chart with different temperatures that need to be maintained and for how long to ensure clean water (see links below).
Filter
Another option is a filtration system. The first time I saw one of these was on a hike up in the Monashees when I was 13. They’re almost the standard now-a-days.
Cryptosporidium and Giardia can measure between 1 and 15 microns. To ensure your water is clear of both of these, make sure your filter can filter smaller than that as bacteria can be as small as 0.2 microns. If you don’t want to take any chances, then go for something with 0.2 micron filtration capacity. Professional pump systems go from $70 up.
Chemical Treatments
What about chemical tablets? The lightest is probably chemical chlorine or chlorine dioxide tablets. The problem is that most only take care of Giardia. Cryptosporidium has a shell that can protect it. Having said that, “Potable Aqua” has some Chlorine Dioxide tablets that claim to kill Cryptosporidium as well, but it takes 4 hours to do the job. You pay $10+ usually for a pack of tablets.
UV Pens
A new and cool solution are UV pens. They use UV light, stirred around for a minute and a half or so to purify the drinking water. Probably the fastest and safest choice, it seems a bit costly ($50+ depending on the model) but with a lifetime of 8000 uses, you will save a lot on fuel and time on the trail. It works out to around 1 penny a use. *Do research on the steripen, there have been mixed reviews about quality and durability!
) but with a lifetime of 8000 uses, you will save a lot on fuel and time on the trail. It works out to around 1 penny a use. *Do research on the steripen, there have been mixed reviews about quality and durability!Conclusion
There are lots of choices to keep your water clean. For those that trust technology, the UV pen (for example Steripen) is the obvious choice. For the Lightweight backpacker check out chlorine dioxide. If you want something reliable try a filtration system. For those of us without the cash up front a 1 minute boil should do the trick.
Have you had a chance to use more than one of these? Which is your favourite and why?
References:
UNBC report
Mitchell Barry – Hiking Water Filters – Do They Stop Giardia and Cryptosporidium?
