Bottled water or Tap Water

[shortland]

Do we need to be cautious about drinking tap water in the Baltic ports - especially in Copenhagen and St. Petersburg? Or, should we drink only bottled water while in the various ports?

[Willsot]

I don't know about Copenhagen, but I understand that the native Russians don't even drink the tap water in St. Petersburg. In St. Petersburg we drank only bottled water and avoided ice.

[Andee]

The tap water is safe in Copenhagen, but we were advised to bring or own water (we fill our bottles with ship's water) and not buy water in St. Petersburg.

[shortland]

Thanks!

[pungo3]

We drank tap water in Copenhagen. In fact, we filled our water bottles from the tap to carry around the city. In Russia, we did purchase bottled water in a couple of restaurants and had no problem. However, we definitely didn't drink the tap water there.

[jeanine]

From what source does the ship's water come from? The water in the cabin sink? While on the competition they supplied bottled water so never drank from the tap. Was wonderful to have this supplied with no additional charge. We drink a gallon a day while traveling! JR

[sultan_sfo]

Each Princess ship has a large desalination plant. Water from sink and any tap on board is quite safe. According to a Travel Channel Show about Princess Ships, minerals are added back in appropriate amounts after desalination. The only aspect not clear, based on posts on the CC board, is whether there remains a higher salt content. The tap water (from sink) on Dawn was rather warm and I had to use ice. And unless one avoids all "ice" on board, one is imbibing the ship's water anyway. I avoid bottled water even in SF because I think removal of all the minerals makes bottled water not suitable. But the rest of the family always drink bottled water! /Sultan

[Jill_b]

Each Princess ship has a large desalination plant. Water from sink and any tap on board is quite safe. According to a Travel Channel Show about Princess Ships, minerals are added back in appropriate amounts after desalination. The only aspect not clear, based on posts on the CC board, is whether there remains a higher salt content. The tap water (from sink) on Dawn was rather warm and I had to use ice. And unless one avoids all "ice" on board, one is imbibing the ship's water anyway. I avoid bottled water even in SF because I think removal of all the minerals makes bottled water not suitable. But the rest of the family always drink bottled water! /Sultan

 

I have had water inspectors out doing tests on my well in the vacation cabin because of a general alert last summer and did a lot of research in water purity. Most bottled water is filtered and not boiled(distilled) so most minerals will remain in bottled water since particles are smaller than the filters used for bio-hazards.

Boiled water unless airiated is flat tasting which is why coffee or tea brewed with water that was boiled tastes boring compared to using cool water brought up to drinking temperature.

 

I asked DenRus a million questions and one was about the water. They said the city water is now passing quality test standards but the pipes might be old and rusty delivering it within a building, so it is normal for locals to use bottled water. The city water is clorinated so there is not a big problem with bio-hazards but the water does not taste as good as filtered bottled water.

Bottled water in St Petersburg should taste better than ship water which is distilled. They also said almost all restaurants have good filter systems installed so ice cubes, washing water and food prep water is safe and tastes good. Newer apartment buildings have filters also. I did not think to ask about drinking fountains in museums, if they have filters.

Jill

[Henrik_Keller]

You can drink the water directly from the tap in Copenhagen. No problem at all.

 

Believe me… I have been doing it for 38 years :D

[Sequim88]

FWIW, and in our limited one cruise experience (so far), we thought the shipboard tap water on HAL's Veendam was very excellent. My understanding was that the desalination process used on most cruise ships for drinking water is reverse osmosis and does not involve boiling or steam condensation. The processes used in reverse osmosis include regulation of minerals and special filtering to assure acceptable taste.

 

For the curious...a link to a diagram: http://www.searecovery.com/Text/reverse_osmosis/whatro.html

 

Some ships use vacuum flash evaporator systems to "boil" water at a lower temp then condense for non-drinking water needs such as dish washing, pools and fire systems.

 

After our Alaska cruise we visited Barrow where we found the whole town's water was RO and there too it tasted very good.

[Wolfpup]

We had lunch last month at a hotel on Nevsky Prospekt and were served bottled water. I thought I would save the bottle, with its Russia lettering, to refill on the ship, but noticed "bottled by Pepsi" in English.

 

When asking for water in Europe, be specific; still water, mineral water or sparkling water.

 

 

Darcy