9 Ways to Avoid One HUGE Camping Mistake!

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Giardia is the main reason why we filter or treat our water outdoors. If infected you can spend a week or more with diarrhea and/or vomiting. Not something you want to deal with while on the trail. Which is why you need to filter or treat you water. I talk about all the ways to filter, purify, and treat your water while camping, hiking, and backpacking.

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[POV]

I know it was fake for the video but for people who find themselves in this situation in real life if you do puke or have explosive diarrhea please don't do it near the water source. Plenty of good woods to walk off and die in don't ruin the water for rest of us lol

[MommaInTheMountains]

I love my Grayl especially in cow ponds (I personally still prefilter through a bandanna or something for sill and debris)

[jasonnowwhat]

Grayl user here. Brought it to Patagonia and use it here in Arizona…I will say that it’s a little big and I just hang it off my pack, BUT pretty awesome piece of mind knowing I’m using an above and beyond solution, especially for here in the states. I carry tablets as backup

[nicklenco]

When I was a kid (circa 40 years ago) we did not worry about “beaver fever” as it us called locally. We were particularly unworried in early spring when there was still some snow hiding under steep, north facing hillsides. Then one guy got hit with the beaver fever on day 1 of a 3 day canoe trip. Now everyone I know treats their water in some manner. Being sick in the woods is terrible. Being that sick in the woods is a nightmare.

[panhandlejake]

A clarification on water treatment and the SteriPen -- they may not be effective in water that has particulates. The more "crap" in the water, the more places bacteria can hide away from the treatment method. In addition, you still have to drink the particulates. In general, prefiltering with a bandanna or some other cloth or screen can help significantly and will extend the life of any filter. The cleaner the water, the better.

[KevinRStrauss]

Excellent review of water treatment options. I'm so happy you gave a quick shoutout to Bleach. After trying pretty much every system over the past 20 years, Bleach has been my Go To for 15+ years and I've never once gotten sick. When timed well, the 30-minute wait time is simply a part of your hiking day or time at camp. I understand the concern for drinking Bleach but given most household tap water is chlorinated, and you can often smell it, that's exactly what Bleach is - Chlorine. So, the water tastes just like what you're drinking at home. (Granted, I use a Berkey Filter at home.) In order to drink water sooner after collecting it, I may pickup a Platypus or Sawyer Squeeze in the near future.

[CharlieDoubleWhiskey]

It's important to note that treatment (boiling, tablets, drops, etc.) does not remove contaminants. It might/probably will render biological contaminants harmless, but does not do much with chemical contaminants like heavy metals, pesticides, fertilizers from farm run-off, or gasoline/diesel spillage from boats/farm equipment. I've used an MSR miniworks pump filter for years for backwoods camping, and just bought a Grayl for travel.

[nilredowski]

0:09 not true in Europe though. In mountains many, many rivers, streams are clear and relatively safe to drink from. I have been drinking from water sources while hiking for years, and only filtering water when I knew there is cattle in the area and they might shit in/near the water, or if the water was passing through human settlements.

[WillWalking]

Boiling water that contains dissolved solids (i.e farming chemicals/heavy metal pollution) will actually strengthen the chemical problem, as you will simply evaporate the water and leave behind more concentrated chemicals. Even Grayl removes only 'some' of the dissolved solids you can find in water around farmland and industry. They are very vague with their stats on this issue, as dissolved solids are a nightmare for purifiers. In the UK, you cannot easily tell if water sources are contaminated, as in Somerset, around the Mendips, the springs are still polluted from Roman lead mining 2000 years ago. The only way to remove these heavy metals and chemicals is a system like Zerowater - which is not designed for hiking, and their 'sports bottle' offers a mere 19 litres per £15 cartridge. The bigger container offers closer to 150L, which is still not much for a long journey, and like many filters, it gets heavy when it is wet. Alas. I use the MSR Guardian - which weighs 700g+! - and am careful where I take water from. If in doubt, purify tap water (which is chemically enough!). Probably we are accumulating chemicals and heavy metals in our bodies regardless. Water doesn't lie, and tells with clarity the truth of human pollution. But like you say, acute water sickness is like no other hiking illness. It goes right through you, as we are largely made of water, it is a full-system sickness. I had a memorable night in a storm-blasted graveyard on a terrible slope in Hastings town, after drinking dodgy water through a squeeze bottle filter that dripped contaminated water through the seal when squeezed. Never again, I hope.

Thanks for your work and advice! Drink well and walk well!

[ZachBrimhall]

I did the same thing with my thumb in a car door when I was 10. Only the car drove off and I barely missed having my thumb ripped off. My thumb swoll up huge and my nail was blood red. My mom got a red hot paper clip and pierced the middle of my thumb nail, blood spouted to the ceiling. It worked and the pain stopped. Get well!

[BrokenBackMountains]

Got fed up with squeeze filters. Took too long and the peaty water still looked like piss. I took the weight hit and now carry a Katadyn vario. It screws on to my collapsible canteen and pumps very quickly. The carbon gives me crystal clear water.
It is surprisingly compact as well and I don't touch the water source at all.

[gdbroque]

Got sick like this at home recently and it was miserable. Can’t imagine on the trail. Glad now I have a MSR guardian, worth the extra weight for the peace of mind imo.

[talmanl]

I, for many years, used tincture of iodine (9 drops/liter and wait 20 min) in the mountains. Yes, you can taste it, but it doesn't taste nearly as bad as giardia. I never had any trouble.

[jackvoss]

Water can be treated by (1) boiling, (2) filtering, or (3) purifying. Both boiling and filtering do only a partial job. Purifiers do the most complete job. (Thar’s why they’re called “purifiers!”).

After only a few minutes of vomiting and diarrhea are enough to convince most folks that a purifier is worth a few extra bucks. Some take, say, an hour of puking and (other uncomfortable activities) to get the message. And, of course, a few will never learn. Each of us are free to choose for ourselves.
Courtesy of Half Vast Flying

[ryansumners]

I had to do one of those lovely state run wilderness programs for 90 days, and saw more than one person get giardia due to drinking unfiltered water or just getting water in there mouth bathing or swimming in the mountains .

[CliveB]

I've seen that you can filter pretty much every nasty little organism through a fresh cut piece of wood. Might only work with certain types of wood and it tikes quite some time for the water to sip through but it's really cool.

[ShortGuysBetaWorks]

Nice one. Have a bias towards the tips over the gear reviews, but understand why the gear reviews are important for channel growth.

[survivalistboards]

Great video, glad you mentioned UV light. When in doubt, I use a combination of filter and UV light.

[thagemizer]

I've used a MSR Sweetwater pump filter with a silica ceramic filter for years. It's good down to about 0.2 microns, or so they say. We still found that after filtering then drinking the water, we would start to pick up a bug after a few days, with the slow onset of diarrhea. Not catastrophic, but not pleasant either. So we started adding a aquatab tablet to each filtered liter. Following the slow agitation and 30 minute contact time, to kill off pretty much everything. The best trick is after that, shaking the water bottle / bladder, and then opening it up to release the chlorine gas that gases out of the water. Then seal, shake, open and gas off, then repeat a few times. This removes almost all chlorine smell and taste, and yet the chlorine has done its' job. Good healthy water, no chlorine stink. This is our process now.

[WasatchWill]

That first shipment of Quickdraws must have been their best as you definitely got one right when they came out and I got mine about a month or two later and it has been flawless so far. The bag it came with...not so much. Seems like in Platypus rush to meet demand since then, they've had issues because others have reported slow flows, busted fibers out of the box, and so forth...and unfortunately when things go south with it, the warranty fulfillment process is insanely long right now...like 4 months. Not good on that front.