[Philmont]: To filter or Polar Pure

This is a moot point at the Double H High Adventure Base. You have to filter your water and bring your own filters. Philmont does not even issue Polar Pure. We brought our own and highly recommend it.

You see at Double H there is NO, and I mean No, surface water, (well ok there is one small surface pond used to irrigate some hay, but you don't hike anywhere near it. ) Your water supplies are your choice of livestock tanks fed by windmills, windmills that feed livestock tanks, livestock tanks and more livestock tanks, although don't get excited, they are VERY far apart. I heard that there was a water buffalo on the ranch, but can't confirm it. The urban legend was that it never had any water in it. Did I mention that you get water from livestock tanks? Sometimes they have windmills, sometimes they have solar powered pumps and sometimes they are gigantic tires cut in half. All of the tanks have cute little goldfish in them.

If you are lucky and if the wind is blowing strong enough, you might be able to collect water from the end of the windmill discharge pipe. That's pretty clean and cool, we just polar pured that. Same goes for the solar powered pumps. If you are unlucky and the wind is not blowing, or the windmill is broken or the pump not working, then you can always pump water from the livestock tank, you know the one with the fish in it, oh yea and the logs or tree limbs. You don't remove those either, so the animals that climb in the tanks with the fish in them can get out. Some of the tanks had pretty clean water in them, but most had the most filthy water one could imagine.

The water that came from the tanks was nasty and dirty. We filtered the water through two bandanna's , used coffee filters and a sediment filter. Twice that worked, as we cleaned the filters every liter or so. My Sweetwater pump never could work. Our MSR did ok, but clogged. At one location the water was so bad we clogged two filters, and the replacement filters. We ended up boiling water for our hike. The adults stayed back and did water duty while the crew did their service project. The fish were fun to watch while we cleaned the clogged filters. It took over three hours for three adults to process about 30 liters of water. That was barely enough to get us the 15 kilometers or so to another windmill, this one solar powered ,so we could get water to get to our campsite over two more mesas.

Water is tough and an art at Philmont. At Double H its survival! Did I mention the windmills, and fish and logs? On several nights we arrived in camp with no water. We stationed a crew member at the windmill with a pot so that as the sun set and we got some thermal winds, the windmills might turn and we could draw a drink of the cool water, before it got to the fish!

Polar Pure, Filter, boiling, what the hey, At philmont at least there is water to worry about. At Double H you have to use a filter, we also used Polar Pure, boiling, bandannas, sponges, coffee filters and settling pans, given the uncertain nature of the supply and were glad to do it! There is treated water at Base Camp, and at Martin Ranch, your halfway point.

That's one thing that they will have to work on at Double H is the water supply. Hopefully it can be done. In the mean time, you need to practice with your filters, know how to clean and repair them and have extra cartridges and parts. If you are going to Double H have a filter for every three people and a spare and at least one if not two extra cartridges per filter. Oh, and don't forget to feed the fish

YIS
Hiking Czar a.k.a.
Fred Mussler, Scoutmaster
Troop 357 Raleigh, NC
Eagle Class of 75
Philmont 1990,98,00,02
Double H Ranch Charter Hiker 717-AA-1

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Received on Thu Sep 9 03:11:03 2004