The standard out here seems to be Hawaiian Isles, 100% Hawaiian Purified Water. Now, I usually drink bottled water at home, because Philly water tastes like they stick a dead fish in the pipe ever couple of hundred gallons. Now don’t get me wrong, Hawaiian Isles is good water, but here’s the description on the bottle:
From the rain clouds in tropical skies to the tops of island mountains, then filtered through layers of volcanic rock to a natural aquifer deep underground, Hawaiian Isles water is purified naturally on its journey to you…
It then goes on to describe the high tech filtering they do to the water. But lets go down the list of what water is going to do on Oahu: Start in clouds? Check. Fall onto volcanic mountains? Check. Seep through porous volcanic rock to the water table? Check. Folks, I’m pretty sure this successfully describes the journey the Honolulu municipal water supply makes. How much would you bet?
Absolutely. Actually, pretty much every water supply that comes from aquifers is “filtered by nature through rocks”. Obviously, not necessarily volcanic rocks, but boring old sedimentary rocks dobit just fine too.
My housemates insist (INSIST!) on buying Nestle bottled water, because it’s better than our well water. From the label on said bottled water: “SOURCES: DEEP PROTECTED WELLS, LEE, FLORIDA.” Lee, FL is 200 miles from the house.
I’m paying to ship well water 200 miles… to a house with a well for water.
The funny thing is, Honolulu tap water tastes fantasic. There’s no real reason to buy bottled here. My advise is to get a cheap bottle of Hawiian Isles, and refill it with municipal water.
I should also point out that the primary reason to drink bottled water is that is really pisses off hippies. In fact, I would make a bottled water my drink of choice if it was made with purified hippie tears, in non-recycled, non-biodegradeable plastic.
In my view, bottled water generally consists of one part sham, one part laziness, and one part status symbol. There are places in the world where I drink bottled water, but in the US, it’s generally quite unnecessary.
The only place I or my parents ever bought bottled water regularly was in the town in southern MN where we lived for a few years. The tap water was horrible, and no filtration we could manage made it drinkable – it was even noticeable in things like iced tea and kool-aid.
For most situations, tap water is fine – at worst, you may need a filter pitcher. I usually reserve bottled water for spur-of-the-moment purchases while traveling.
I never thought of Boise city tap water as being all that bad–until we moved into our current house. The well water is absolutely WONDERFUL. Falls as rain? Check. Filtered for several thousand years through granite and basalt? Check. Except for being a little heavier in iron than optimal, it’s just perfect. Now, Boise city tap water is just disgusting.
Congratulations on the expansion of your blog to include so many expert co-bloggers. I’m enjoying it very much.
You will get better water from the tap than bottled water. Bottled water is far less regulated than municipal tap water. Tap is cheaper too. Although tap water still has the disadvantages in many areas of tasting terrible and there is still contaminants that most of us would rather not ingest. I say if you don’t filter your water you become the filter.