Lifestraw personal water filter
This $20 Piece of Hardware Belongs in Your Pack for Every Hike, In Your Tent for
Every Campout, and In Your Glovebox or Desk Drawer at All Other Times
To show you that we practice what we preach, please note at the top here that we have no fewer than three LifeStraws in our house. Well, actually, there is only one in the house, and that’s the one that always comes on camping trips and hikes and travel. The other two stay in the cars. Have we ever needed to use a LifeStraw in an emergency where clean water was rendered unavailable? No, not yet. But at less than $20 per water filter, it’s an investment we’re glad to have made even if we never find ourselves stranded with a flat in the middle of the woods, cut off from clean water at home by a natural disaster, or just really, really thirsty on a long hike when the hydration packs and water bottles have run dry.
Before we talk about the specifics of the LifeStraw Personal Water Filter, though, let’s just talk about water. And specifically about how much of it you need. The average adult needs to consume eight ounces of water eight times each day to remain healthy, which amounts to 64 ounces – AKA a half gallon – daily. We can do the math, then, and find that you likely consume about 180 to 185 gallons of water per year.
At that rate, you could, in theory, take every sip of water you consumed through a LifeStraw for well over five years and still count on this plucky little gadget to have a bit of service life remaining. That’s because each LifeStraw is rated to effectively filter up to 1,000 gallons (or 4,000 liters of water).
And by filter, that is to say removing 99.999% of bacteria, removing 99.999% of parasites, removing 99.999% of microplastics, and more. You can quite literally stick a LifeStraw into a muddy puddle, dirty river, a bucket left out in the rain, or, yes, a toilet, and drink with confidence that the only thing that will reach your mouth – not to mention the rest of your body – is clean, safe H2O.
As the name suggests, a LifeStraw is shaped like a big straw. It’s about 10 inches long and weighs about a third of a pound, thus you can fit one into any pack, not to mention any glove compartment or drawer or whatnot. And though you can jam one end right into a water supply, you can also screw a LifeStraw onto a standard water bottle, so it’s easy to collect and carry water or to be extra safe with a bottled beverage you don’t quite trust.
Overall, “extra safe” is probably the right way to sign off when talking about a LifeStraw. Will you bring a large filter along for filling water bottles and hydration packs and for cooking and such when you’re on a multi-day trek? Yes. Will you likely have enough water at your campsite? Also yes. Is you home likely to get cut off from safe water? Probably no. But safety and preparation first, right? Definitely yes.
