No expert but have drank water from most of the major mountain ranges in the world and love it! I lead trips to places where people drink ‘wild’ water very often on my recommendation. Some great rules of thumb:
If you can see the source(glacier, cliff, hole in the rock) and there is nothing between you and it that is on legs, you should be fine
Water from waterfalls with no human settlement above them are pretty safe. The bigger the better. And make damn sure you know there isn’t something up there.
The more ‘wild’ water you have had, the safer you are
The Baiyang water curtain trail is the classic example of number 1 and 2. I drink it every time I am up there and at this point hundreds of other folks have as well.(from the ceiling, before there are any comments about shoes) And I bring it home for my pregnant wife sometimes too! There are lots and lots of places that I drink ‘wild’ water from in Taiwan but they are not random and the first time I try a new spot I only drink a little and see what my body tells me.
At this point all the horror stories I have ever heard have involved something/one stupid like drinking out of a stagnant pool below a village or drinking water from a lake beside a beaver damn. And not washing poopy hands, which seems to be the biggest one.
I love water from the wild, and I feel ‘off’ if I don’t have some at least once a week. Feels like spinach is to popeye for me sometimes. Like everything else I think you should build up a tolerance to it and if you have a weak/city body to have to be a lot more careful, but I think it is one of the most healthy things you can do for your body. But again, I am no expert, just some idiot on the internet…
In the big city they have ‘natural’ osmosis ‘minerals’ added water.
I regularly see small blue trucks next to some mountain roads in Sanxia filling plastic containers with ‘natural’ spring water … where the water originates no-one knows I guess … sometimes some of them run dry after weeks of no rain … BTW, they threat it with osmosis and then sell it as mountain water.
Sure, I like hiking. If you like I’ll even bring a bottle of water for you. You sound pretty skint so I’ll be happy to shell out the 10 NTD for you.
The quoted sounds like utter crap. Introducing microbes into your system to keep up your immune system is one thing, magic mountain tonic water is another. For your sake I hope you never get yourself, your customers, your wife or your unborn child poisoned.
For those who might be interested, my Sawyer PointZeroTWO has been operating for a few weeks. It works in the sense that:
a) It filters water
b) I ain’t dead yet
On the other hand, the advertised performance is a huge exaggeration. According to Sawyer it provides “up to 170gallons [650L] water a day”. Not even close. It filters ~100ml/min, and it clogs to a trickle after 3L or less (you have to backwash it endlessly). That’s fine for a camping trip, of course, but for $120 plus shipping I wasn’t overly impressed. The PointONE is much cheaper, apparently filters faster, and presumably clogs less easily, so that might be better for general use, although it won’t filter viruses.
