I know you responsible travelers are on-board with the very eco-friendly concept of treating your own drinking water when traveling. When water-bourne viruses are not a risk, I personally like to use good old iodine tablets as a quick and easy way to make my own drinking water and help keep plastic bottles out of the world’s landfills (and gutters).
Even though most iodine tablets come with a stabilizer pill that removes the less-than-pleasant taste, treated drinking water in a developing country still will rarely taste like Evian. That’s why I often bring a rehydration powder or tablet to help mask the taste.
Rehydration powders and tablets are doubly fantastic when traveling in hot climates or doing outdoor activities like hiking and biking.
You could always reach for the classic Gatorade, which is sold in powder form, but it contains high fructose corn syrup. Here are a few of my favorite alternatives:
NUUN
These handy little tablets come in some super delicious flavors: my faves are the Orange Ginger and Lemon-Lime. They are free of sugar and any other scary additives or artificial colors. The tablets are clean to use (no powder to mix) and dissolve right in your water bottle. And even the tube they come in is recyclable!
Emergen-C
Many of my friends have kept the little Emergen-C packets onhand for many years, so that you can deliver a 1,000mg punch of Vitamin C whenever you feel a cold coming on. (Great for hangovers too) But now these tasty little packets also have a special Electro-mix made specially for electrolyte replacement, while still beefing up your vitamin intake.
Make your own!
For the thrifty and inventive folks out there, follow this simple recipe to make your own electrolyte-enhanced water: mix 1 tsp of salt and 8 teaspoons of sugar into 1 litre of treated drinking water. Voila!
If you didn’t catch it the first time, here’s a link to my post about different methods of treating your drinking water while on the road.