Water – mains tap water, bottled water…..or farm borehole water?
During your stay at Lower Marsh Farm you can enjoy the taste of bottled spring water straight from the tap! This is because the farm is on borehole water rather than mains water.
A borehole is a bit like a well but a lot deeper (most wells are 100 feet deep whereas the borehole is approximately 230 feet deep). Borehole water comes from underground aquifers; these water pockets in the bedrock layer. This layer is basically solid rock where water seeps through any cracks into these pockets. Using ‘water listening sticks’ (a bit like the telephones children make from cups and a bit of string) and dowsing rods (do not ask me how these work…but they do), these aquifers are found and then the drill goes down. Occasionally no water is found, but mostly it is reached first time!
The water is pumped to a treatment plant which uses UV and filters to ensure the water is safe to drink. Nothing is added. This means that the water tastes like water, rather than mains tap water which has been treated with chlorine and sometimes fluoride added. It is the taste of chlorine that often drives people to buy bottled water. More recently concerns have been raised regarding the levels of oestrogen and micro-plastics in water supplies. Sometimes people believe that bottled water is ‘safer’ as it has less contaminants but various research projects have disproved this.
In addition to bottled water not being any better for you, it comes with some disastrous environmental impacts from the plastic packaging, fossil fuel usage to transport the water around, use of water (3l of water is used to package 1l of bottled water!), sales and marketing etc etc.
Our plea to you is; please do not buy bottled water for your stay at the farm. Please at least try the water here first.
Even if you are a fizzy water aficionado, please let us know as we have a water carbonator and can make some up for you.
The environmental impact of bottled water “up to 3,500 times greater than tap water”.
Ice – what about it?
Our second plea to you is: please do not buy ice cubes.
We will put some fresh ice cubes in your property’s freezer for your stay. If you want more, please just let us know. This way you do not need to a big bag from the supermarket, which you may only half use leaving it to be melted and go waste after your departure. Save waste, money and reduce your carbon footprint.
Some useful references
- Harvard University
- WaterOrg.uk
- The Water Project