Planning Want some advice reguarding filtering water in the uk

[Paul_B]

A hiking magazine did an article about tests they had carried out on water sources in a popular wildcamping area of the Lake District. They found many bacteria types in quantities that could cause problems in several locations. One spot iirc had a serious pathogen / virus. I think hepatitis but I can't be sure I've remembered it correctly.

The problem locations were mostly tarns or outflow from tarns. I was always told to collect your water from inflows to tarns or as high up as you can get. Obviously checking upstream for some way. Also, the water course needs to be free-flowing over rocks for some way upstream. I've seen people collecting from a free-flowing stream without checking and later they found out there was a dead sheep in it just above their collection spot. I've also seen toilet paper on a rock midstream. Not sure of where it came from but that stream was not going to be my water source.

I had a drinksafe filter from when they first came out. Good kit I think. I had a dirty water bladder and a clean bladder. Between them I put the filter. I also used the dirty bladder with filter straight into a bite valve to drink from. Both options worked well.

I now have a sawyer filter. Never used it yet. Bought for a trip as a backup but never needed it. We're off soon on a cycle tour in Scotland and expect to wildcamp a bit. We're looking at whether the sawyer filter with the squeeze / flexible bottle feed into the filter is good enough for 3 of us or whether we should get something better. Not sure which way to go.

 

[Suffolkrafter]

Not much to add to the good advice already given, but one thing to consider (particularly in the case of the lake District) is to consider mines. Some crystal clear streams in the LD that appear perfect for drinking are among the most poluted in the UK due to heavy metals. I would avoid streams contaminated by outflows from mines.

 

[StevieE]

I'm originally from the Welsh valleys where mining was common place but behind where the colliery was there were huge swathes of pine forest (rumour went that it owned by Terry Wogan but I've no idea if there was any truth in that). In the middle of the forest was a pipe in the middle of a hill that my father said was pure spring water and in fairness the vegetation around was as lush as you could ever expect. All of my family used to regularly fill an empty bottle with it to drink, without any sort of filtering. I have to say it was the coldest and best tasting water I've ever had. No idea where it originated from and with hindsight probably not the best thing to do but this was 40 years ago and none of us ever got ill on it.

 

[SaraR]

Not much to add to the good advice already given, but one thing to consider (particularly in the case of the lake District) is to consider mines. Some crystal clear streams in the LD that appear perfect for drinking are among the most poluted in the UK due to heavy metals. I would avoid streams contaminated by outflows from mines.

Same goes for many of the streams and rivers in Mid-Wales. A lot of the metals are stuck to tiny sediment particles though, so filtering those out will get rid of some of it.