When you are sailing in the Mediterranean or in tropical destinations you might come in the position to replenish your fresh-water tanks. Not from every tap you get drinking water. Even if you read “drinking water” on the tag, be careful! That is not necessarily real drinking water that is safe and well tolerated by your stomach.
When you are sailing in the Mediterranean or in tropical destinations you might come in the position to replenish your fresh-water tanks. Not from every tap you get drinking water. Even if you read “drinking water” on the tag, be careful! That is not necessarily real drinking water that is safe and well tolerated by your stomach.
The water quality and cleanness can be significantly enhanced with different disinfection agents or in worst cases even by using mechanic filters. Furthermore, you must remember that in many sailing regions tap water may come from different sources. Fresh font water from mountainous areas or water from deep wells has usually the best quality. On many Mediterranean and tropical islands, on the contrary, drinking water is delivered by tank ships. Also, like in old times, rainwater is gathered in cisterns. In some tensely populated coastal areas drinking water is even gained from seawater by difficult and energy-intensive desalination processes.
In areas where there is a scarcity of groundwater, like on islands, drinking water is brought by ships and it is often being transported in tanks for a long period of time before it comes out from a tap. It is usually treated with chemicals and mechanic filters that make it clean and long durable. As a negative result you often have tap water with a strong taste and smell of chlorine or other substances that have been added to improve the quality of the water.
Such “drinking water” is not necessarily what you want to have in the tanks of the yacht during your sailing holidays!
Therefore, we recommend that you taste and visually test (in a clean glass) the tap water before filling up your tanks. If you notice an unpleasant smell or a slight colour or clouding, then you’d better be careful. If possible, you should better look for an alternative. Even if you fill up with water, which seems clean and fresh, there is still a risk that the water tanks of your boat have already been affected by unclean water earlier. Remember: Boiling kills the germs, but it does not remove possible impurity and added agents, such as heavy metals or salts.
So always be careful when you fill your tanks before starting your boating vacation because you don’t want to have unpleasant surprises that would ruin your sailing trip. You can use the tap water from your tank to brush your teeth and shower, however, as a precaution you should better use bottle water for cooking and drinking if there are any doubts.
Felix Wolf f.wolf@yachtbooker.comFelix Wolf is co-founder and owner of YachtBooker. He is a charter skipper himself and enjoys discovering new sailing areas.