Often times people deride drinking bottled water because a lot of it is bottled from a municipal water system (the tap). However, not all tap water is equal. I’ve traveled far more than any person should and have drunk a lot of tap water and I have to say the best tap water I’ve ever had was from Seattle Washington. Where has your best water been?
Salina, Utah. 1970’s. The tap water came from a spring up the canyon about 20 miles. It was so delicious.
Now, it is treated for consumption. It ain’t the same.
I guess my favorite would be from the tap at the Inyo National Forest ranger station just up the hill from Lee Vining. I make a point of stopping whenever I pass by to fill all my water bottles with sweet Sierra water. Second would be the public water fountains in Dunsmuir, California–the city slogan is “Home to the best water on earth”.
New York City tap. They aren’t kidding when they say its good.
Durango, Colorado.
The town of Pacific Beach along the Washington state coast. Our family used to vacation there frequently. I’ve heard that the area has changed a lot, though, so maybe the water isn’t so good anymore.
Beer.
Glacier runoff in Tibet.
Cherry Knoll spring water, South Amherst Ohio. 10 cents a gallon self serve for many years, now 25 cents. I’ve got 8 gallons on hand.
Dennis
We live in the wilderness west of Seattle. Our well water is really danged good. We bought this house having barely looked at it, certainly not having tasted the water, and were sweating bullets about that on the drive out here. No worries, it turns out.
New York City used to be the best in the world. It’s still great, but not the same, due to upstate development.
The well water from the house in which I grew up in rural South Georgia in the 70s. It came right out of the tap ice cold and sweet. I have not had water that good since my mother sold that house in the 90s.
Town of Banff.
Denver is very fortunate to have some great-tasting water right out of the tap. I usually take it for granted until I go to someone else’s house in the metro area that’s not on Denver’s water system.
Heh, the municipal water in Tyler, TX. It’s got a mineral-y flavor that I can still taste even though I haven’t been there in years, and would like an ice cold glass of it.
The water in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, is pretty darn good. Just down the road in Iowa City, it’s pretty bad.
On the other hand, Ames takes pride in their water. A lot of pride. Unseemly pride. Check out 56 seconds into this video.
And then they mention the water again at 1:45! Hooray!
Well water at my parent’s house, before they hooked up to the county. Suuper minerally…would leave deposits in a glass if left to evaporate.
Kansas City municipal water is really good, too. No chemical or chlorine that I can detect. I seem to recall that it won an award or something for municipal water supply.
Worst: Warrensburg, MO. Overpowering sulfur taste and smell. You get used to it eventually, but a steamy shower will stink up the whole house.
We have very good water in Upstate New York from Skaneateles Lake, one of the cleanest, unpolluted bodies of water in the world. When I was younger, in the 70’s, we had vacations on Wellesley Island in the Thousand Islands, on the St. Lawrence River (just across the border from Canada). Things closed down on the island in the winter, in the summer we walked to the water pump in the village and filled up containers of excellent cold water with an iron/mineral taste. (though the water from the tap there was just fine, there was something about the water from the village pump that was more fun to drink).
We had outstanding water from local common wells in the suburb of Sacramento I grew up in. I had many chances to come back and taste it again until my 30’s and it always tasted shockingly good. (Fortunately, in living several places within 15 miles of that location, we always had good water. I can’t remember any of the rentals I had in that era that had even blah water - always good-tasting. I was probably very lucky.)
The well water on my grandparent’s ND farm in the 1970s was… more of the same. I assume it had something of the same mineralization but more of it.
Tap water here in the metro-Detroit area is really good. I’ve had zero issues with it my entire life.
Flint is pretty far away, folks. I still can’t believe our governor did not resign over that.