Where do you get your drinking water, and why?
 

As I fill my Arrowhead bottle at the tap water drinking founting, a question occurs to me: Where do you get your primary source of drinking water, and for what reasons?

The majority of my drinking water is either bottled sparkling water (2L store brand, not pelligrino), for flavor reasons (it was a way to ween off soda), or the filtered stuff out of the front of my fridge. We do, however usually have a flat of water bottles I try not to use except when I really need the convenience. I think cost is the biggest reason why we aren't 100% water bottle, although honestly I drink so much water it's almost inconvenient to be restricted to 12oz portions.

What water do you drink, and why?

I filter at home. It's just easier than getting water delivered or bottled, not to mention I can't stand that plastic taste. I have an old Kenmore reverse osmosis system under the sink that I've been very happy with.

I'm surprised this topic hasn't been covered already at some point.

Deer Park by the case from Costco. I pay for the convenience and I enjoy the taste. I also have a Brita pitcher at home for making coffee or tea.

Ice Mountain and Spring bottled water. The only two brands of water in Chicago that don't taste like metal.

I've been turned off from drinking from the tap by past experiences even though we have a very good filter.

I drink water from the tap. It's cheap, it's convenient, and it tastes just fine. 60% of my city's water comes from the Willamette River, and 40% from a rural watershed in the Coast Range. Thanks to an uncle who is an environmental engineer and a SO who is studying to be a chemical engineer with an environmental engineering option, I understand a lot now about what happens to my water before it comes out of the tap and what happens to it after it goes down the drain.

There are definitely parts of the country where I prefer bottled water, mainly the Southwest. The water there SUCKS.

I too drink from the tap. There's some good water here in Toronto.

Living in Northern Colorado, there is no good reason not to drink tap water. Everything that needs to be filtered out has already been done so at the water treatment plant. I have been told that we have some of the best 'first' water (straight from the snow melt) on the planet. It would be a shame to waste it. We do keep a filter pitcher in our fridge because my MIL gave it to us. It is a good way to keep cold water handy.

I do buy the occasional bottled water. There are times when it is very convenient.

I have a water cooler that uses 5 gallon jugs. I refill them from a natural spring about 2 miles from where I work. The government has tried to stop the practice, and has posted signs that the water is not drinkable. Surprisingly, when we take a sample in to be tested every year, it comes back absolutely perfect. The taste is great, it's natural, available 24/7, and it amazes my kids that water just popping up out of the ground is perfectly potable.

Lord, our society has moved so far from nature it's scary.

I've never understood the appeal of bottled water. Why would I pay $2 for something I can get at home, that is essentially free?

We do have a Brita on-tap filter, but that's because without it the water comes out cloudy. I don't want to drink cloudy water.

In every other apartment I've had I drank the water straight out of the tap, and was perfectly okay with that.

tap water all the way - why pay for something that is (nominally) free?

My body is full of delicious tap water.

The fricken Tap. I am always gobsmacked to see people at the Grocery Store loading up on bottled water.

Why would you pay for something that comes out of the tap for next to nothing? On top of this, water marketers are fucking with our ecology. Not only are they selling us something we already own they are taking water from one water table and moving it to others.

The other concern I have is plastic bottles. BPA is a very nasty chemical.

Too much chlorine in the local water, so we Brita most of our water. For convenience when traveling or chorus rehearsal, cheap flats from Costco (I've lost too many nice refillable bottles by leaving them at rehearsal).

I think my tap water tastes funny, so I use a Brita pitcher. I want to get one of those on-the-faucet filters with the flavored syrup--yum.

The tap. But I have a Brita pitcher. Denver has good water... I don't know what I have the pitcher.

From the tap. i am on a well, and the water is decent. At work we have a water cooler, so I drink that.

My tap water has so much iron and chlorine in it that it burns through a Brita in about two weeks with the amount I drink. My whites are all pink and my hair turns red every time I live on this side of town (3rd time in 9 years). So I go through a 2.5 gallon jug of Zephyrhills drinking water and 8 24 oz sport bottles of the Zeph a week. When I'm at work, I'll drink water from the filtered taps any time. But at home, it's just bad. I'll do the Publix brand water, too, but the Zephyrhills tastes better. If I have the option, I choose Dasani or SmartWater just because of the taste.... it tastes more like the well water I used to have and love as a kid. Just can't afford them on a larger scale.

But, you didn't have "health reasons" on the poll. I caught c. diff when I was in college from one of those refillable things at the grocery store where you can refill your own jugs. I refuse to use them... and then I saw a thing on the Discovery Channel where they actually swabbed the inside of the mouth of the tubes that dispense the water and the amount of insect droppings and bacteria freaked me out. I can't even walk past one of those things any more. eeeew!

The reason Dasani tastes like the well water you remember is because it comes from municipal water supply... i.e. the tap.

What's shocking is that you live in the US and have substandard water supply. That should be inexcusable.

We have Poland Springs delivered. The tap water here is from wells and it is heavy with minerals. We've tried a couple of filters but don't care for the taste. Even after filtering, it tastes vaguely metallic.

Usually I drink mineral water (here is very cheap. I barred the cheap-flat of water option.) for the taste and for the healthy, sometimes from the tap when is finished. Is good too but a little havier.

an american friend of mine (from california) was surprised to see sparkling water common, here many people almost never drink from the tap because they like sparlking water (and I see here is not an option).

Either from tap or from the fridge, which has a filter...that I don't remember ever being changed at all in the past 10 years. But I'm fine with it. When I'm at my gf's place, I use the water filter pitcher. I told her the tap water is fine but she doesn't believe me so she either buys a case every week or not drink at all. So I got her the pitcher to ease her mind. Else where I just drink from the tap, or if they have a pitcher I'll drink from there...'cause it's always in the fridge so it's nice and cold.

The water I use for the beer I make comes from the tap. If it is good enough for making beer, it is good enough for drinking.

*waves to snowy*

I'll never forget the first time I tried the tap water after moving here (just north of Vancouver WA) - it almost tasted sweet! After living in CA for decades, I'd given up on drinking water from the tap (so nasty!), but up here in SW WA, the water's fine.

When we used to live in the apartments near school we had a Sparklets water dispenser because the tap water tasted and smelled like crap. The calcium and other junk in it is so bad that our ice cubes felt dusty and it would leave a white layer at the bottom of the glass. Even dishes ran through the dish washer would come out with calcium deposits on them and my shower head would get little calcium stalactites hanging from it.

Where we live now is much better, water has a little chlorine taste but its not bad. Where my parents live its all well water so its not to bad, though the taste has changed over time due to treatment.They have a reverse osmosis system in line to the kitchen for drinking and cooking water.

I will buy bottle water if I am out and about and forgot my water bottle at home.

Tap water. Until it comes out of the faucet in a brown gooey sludge, there is no way in hell that I'm going to pay for bottled water, that I'm 99.9% positive came out of someone else's tap. Biggest marketing coup in history.

Speaking of 99.9%...my parents had thier water supply tested by the State of Pennsylvania several years back. The state wanted to test it as thier water comes from a well sunk into an underground mountain spring that was located by an old man with a dousing rod (true story). They tested it on three seperate occasions, and came up with the same 99.9% pure every time. And it's cold. And, I do mean cold. Growing up, it was quite normal for me to see the faucets frost over when you left the cold water running. Instant ice water from the tap. I was spoiled.

Yes, it does almost taste sweet compared to water from California and the Southwest.

My parents have a well up in the Puget Sound. I did a blind taste test at a family event, comparing Arrowhead bottled water to their well. The taste of the well water won in my small sample (10 people). Most people also guessed wrong, when asked to hazard a guess as to which was the bottled water, choosing the well water instead. Our water is not as good as theirs, but it's still better than Dasani or Aquafina, both of which are really just municipal water run through a reverse osmosis process.

Yes, but it's a better tap than mine. :)

And you're right, Charlatan, the water treatment is ridiculous.

..yes it is.

When I turn on the tap, the smell of chlorine is strong.

The dangers of drinking chlorinated water are documented.

Showering in it is particularly bad, (the steam releases more chlorine)
bathing, public swimming pools, hot tubs, etc. Not good.

I drink distilled water.

I drink from the tap. We do have a brita that I keep filled on the counter, but that's for other members of the family who have a preference. Our fridge has a filtered water supply that is cold, and the coffee maker has a built in filter as well (Cuisinart).

But the tap water here taste just fine. Personally, I prefer the kitchen tap to the bathroom faucets, and on a hot summer's day, there's nothing like drinking from the garden hose. mmmm mmmmmm.


We do keep a supply of bottled water on hand (3 quart jugs? not sure on the litre size is perhaps 4 litres) for what is termed emergency preparedness but what usually gets used up on trips to the cottage.

WOW, I'm amazed how many people here drink from the tap. 20 years ago my friend Greg (a biochemist) sampled water all over the USA with filters and then have those analyzed. We were shocked how badly 98% of the major cities scored. Our Dallas Tex water was subgrade and had lots of metal in it. And tasted like crap. Greg wrote his grad thesis on this BTW - the cities and the chemicals in the water. Consequentially, I've been buying water in large quantities from Costco or the local small market and reusing the bottles for a few times with refills of Brita or other "waters" from larger containers. I use bottled water on my plants who thrive & Love the better water. If I use tap they get wilty and/or die. Tells ya something, doesn't it.

When I lived in Marin County & Napa in northern Ca. the tap water tasted horrible. From there I started looking for better alternatives.

Thanks for this post....it is quite enlightening.

in canada: tap. awesome taste and price. I will never buy bottled water as they usually come from bottling plan:tap water from toronto.

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Same thing happened with the spring that I fill my bottles from. The province claimed the water wasn't safe for drinking because there were no controls on it... animals could die in it, or pollute it in other ways (I'll leave that to your imagination). Yet every year we have it tested, and it comes back perfect every time... no organics, just enough minerals to provide good taste, 0 grains of hardness. Absolutely great water, but because they don't control it, the government wants people not to use it. They had a program of capping springs, believe it or not, until the public outcry stopped it.