TC: Send them to you? At the hotel? Nice promotion, you are shameless. There is, of course, a lot of differing opinion about hydration, much of it fueled no doubt by "sports beverages" and water bottlers. The annals of travel are filled with those who endured much deprivation before "slaking their thirst" My personal experience is that the "diuretics" do just that, add hydrochlorothiazide (more "old guy" stuff), and a mild case of turistas and you are losing water fast, too fast to adequately keep up. My results are often severe leg cramps, calambres, at the most inopportune times in the middle of an otherwise pleasant night... measured intake of safe water is pretty important. The other result is that when I allow myself to be dehydrated it often leads to poor decision making (see above) and equally important poor operation of my machine (foot down too late, pull clutch when meaning to dim lights, other really stupid and potentially dangerous stuff just because the gourd is water deprived. It is a mild pain in the ass to stop every hour and take off the helmet for a drink of water but I have found that it makes a huge difference at the end of my day.
Just down a bottle of water or your favorite sports drink every Pemex stop. Keep one mondo size bottle on the bike in case you break down. This isn't rocket science.
On the mtn stream water thing: There was a time in maybe the 1960's or 70's that giardia & chryptosporidium started appearing in the rockie mtns. The warnings against the old ways of carrying a cup(commonly called sierra cups) & drinking what had been considered safe water when above the areas of livestock & humans was at an end. Certainly it's true that there have always been beaver poop,marmot poop & myriad other versions of crap in the waters there but there came a time when the above started to appear and many ended up in the hospital. I don't pretend to be any sort of biology whiz nor water purification guru but do distinctly remember the time that the high elevation waters became patently unsafe. As to straws mentioned above they too fall under the non virustat issue I mentioned. Many people that stay in back country adhere to boiling their water from suspect sources as the truly "safe"way to purify. FWIW, I have seen several entrprenuers in Mexico selling "rebottled water" in small plastic btls. I don't see a reason to worry over the 5 gallon version.
The Steripen - what it kills LINK Not only good for moto travel here and abroad, but also to keep around the house for the zombie apocalypse or collapse of the power grid due to Chinese spies. Even if you're only moderately intelligent, you're still smarter than I am, and you can figure out a way to deal with sediment if you need to. If you don't need to deal with sediment in the water, then you simply move on to treat it with a Steripen in the quantity needed and carry on. I always stay at the same hotel in San Miguel. There's always a pitcher of tap water in the room. One time I drank it straight, and one time I treated it with the Steripen. Not hard to guess which occasion gave me the zaps. On the subject of on-moto provisions, carry a collection of Clif bars or equivalent, and if you find yourself stuck somewhere, or a long time between meals, along with your water treatment capability, your moto travel contingency pack is way ahead of the average Joe.
Which one do you use? It looks like they have a number of options.. The rechargeable looks like it would be nice until that one time you need it and have to recharge it first.. AA's might be nice for a quick replacement. I would probably use it in a Nalgene bottle, is this a "size matters" situation where you would want a longer probe or just stir it longer? I don't see the traveler mini being very effective in a liter bottle.
I've been thinking of making a trip to REI (or wherever) with my water bottles in hand, because I've had the same question. A NEW smaller model with solar charger is supposed to come out in Jan...
I saw a little solar charger in the Freedom video clip but didn't see it as an accessory, I wonder if that's the solar charger you mention being available in January.. What would be nice is a steripen lid accessory where you could screw it on a Nalgene bottle and slowly shake/stir the bottle..
And yes, a Nalgene bottle is perfect. The wide mouth lets you swirl the Steripen around per instructions. Drink from the Nalgene bottle or dump it in your Camelbak, whatever. I refilled my water stock at a mountain stream on the side of the dirt road leading to Batopilas. I had run out of bottled water and was parched. Sure, could have waited for arrival in Bato, but point is, didn't have to. City, country, forest, field - if you can find water you can treat it and drink it. I suppose if someone wanted to expand this discussion to what about industrial chemical removal we could be here all day - for the rest of us, the gist is just carry something to treat water and so if you run out of bottled water you're not stuck.
Forget the little solar charger. You won't be on the Lewis and Clark Expedition anytime soon. Keep all your stuff to the absolute minimum. Pack light. Anything you pack has to be unpacked and repacked, and constantly. Worry about extra camera cards and a spare battery for that. People are not taking enough photos these days. Who cares if you die of thirst, I want to see your photos.
Solar charger is not sold separately. Regarding the product avail in Jan, see here: http://www.steripen.com/-adventurer-opti-solar-charger I've seen poor reviews of the unit/solar charger that's being phased out - wonder if they're correcting some problems. The solar charger comes with the unit that does not have (easily) replaceable batteries. So might be handy in a certain situations. I think I'd get the steripen with a number of activities in mind, not just riding in Mexico. There are adapters for the steripen pre-filters that fit various bottles, but not necessarily designed for steripen itself, I think. Currently sorting through the 1500 photos I took on my summer tour. Hoo boy it's a job, but I think I got a few good ones!
Like advice from any source via the internet, its worth what you paid for it. My advice merely reflects my own formula, and the classic "YMMV" always applies. Everyone can and should make different choices for their own applications. There exists already on ADV many threads on water carrying/filtration/sanitation. As you would expect on a motorcycle adventure touring site. Using the Google site search protocol will return spades full of this already plowed ground. site:advrider.com my search word or phrase
You are on it today Trice. Lots of good information that will be useful to all of us who are heading South. Didn't know about the Steripen and gonna get on it right away. Clif bar advice also good. So many of these things are common sense but your experienced comments go beyond simple good sense.
