Linville Gorge

There wouldn’t be enough hours in the day to comment on all the stupid things I see on the TV. For instance, on the news today was a story about a woman who was lost in the woods and survived several days by drinking creek water. The news announcer made an expression of disgust when he said “creek water.”

My immediate thought was, “Ooh, how horrible – creek water! (Sarcasm). It was probably more pure than the stuff that comes out of our kitchen faucets.”

My next thought was, “Isn’t creek water what humans drank for hundreds of thousands of years until we invented municipal water systems and chlorination? Isn’t creek water basically what many third-world humans still drink?”

My final thought on the subject wasn’t in words; it was a memory. There’s a place in western North Carolina called Linville Gorge. It’s also called “The Grand Canyon of North Carolina.” It’s a beautiful place. Like the Grand Canyon, Linville Gorge is deeper than it appears from the top. In the picture below, that little “trickle” of water you see at the bottom of the gorge is actually the Linville River.

One summer day I hiked to the bottom of the gorge with my brother Ken and his wife, and the three of us hiked along the river until nightfall. (At one point we passed a group of friends, male and female, swimming in the river and having a good time.) We spent the night camped by the river. The next morning Ken and I continued down the gorge while Ken’s wife retraced her steps to where we entered – a gentler hike to the rim than where Ken and I were headed. Soon my supply of drinking water was gone and I was thirsty. I didn’t want to drink the river water; I was reasonably sure that would be a bad idea. I trudged onward until I came upon a large rock outcrop jutting from the sloped land beside the river. From the top of the rock a trickle of water fell to the earth below. It was clear and I knew it would be pure. It wasn’t coming through towns and cities upstream as was the river water. It was coming from the earth itself, as pure as spring water. I held out my water bottle and filled it – and I can honestly say it was the best tasting water I ever drank. My energy was renewed – a good thing, because I spent most of the day hiking uphill to get out of the gorge. I recall a most welcome sight that day: treetops a hundred feet above us lit by sunlight. The sun, low in the afternoon sky, illuminated those treetops because they were above the the rim of the gorge. We were near the top of the gorge. I survived drinking the water trickling off that rock outcrop. It didn’t kill me; it didn’t make me sick. It was refreshing and tasty and it renewed me.

More than half of Americans drink bottled water in preference to municipal water. And, of course, it hasn’t been that long ago that everyone drank well water or spring water.

I’m not suggesting you should drink creek water. There are no guarantees … it is possible the water could be contaminated. Don’t drink it if you have an alternative. Disinfect it with iodine if you can. But if there is no alternative, use common sense. If you’re in a remote area away from factories and farms and people, the water is probably fine. There’s no need to avoid it like it’s radioactive. And there’s no need to make a face when you utter the words “creek water.”