How is the water onboard?

[ducklite]

My husband and I are both environmentally concious and both use refillable water bottles. Is there a place to get cool filtered water onboard? How does the ship water taste?

[Mands&Ian]

My husband and I are both environmentally concious and both use refillable water bottles. Is there a place to get cool filtered water onboard? How does the ship water taste?

 

Ship's water tastes fine to me :)

 

Failing that there's a filtered water dispenser set up in the gym (this is the Surf, yes?) each day. In the past it's been lightly flavoured with fruits and/or herbs. A slice of pineapple, half of lemon, a few pieces of rosemary, that sort of thing. Within the total volume of the water it gives a hint of taste, nothing too overpowering.

 

Failing that the Compass Rose will almost certainly refill your refillable bottles if you ask.

 

HTH,

Mands

[stcruise]

Not sure about the Wind Surf, but I do know that the Wind Spirit uses a desalination process for their water (took the engine room tour last year!). It was explained that while they have the ability to take on water in ports, they prefer not to - they have much more control over the quality and taste with their own system. The water tasted fine to me.

 

On the Wind Spirit we also had a water dispenser with fruit set up daily at the pool area.

 

I'm sure you will have no problem filling up your reusable bottles.

[deckofficer]

There are two methods for providing potable water onboard. One is reverse osmosis, a high pressure system pushing sea water through membranes. The other is evap, which uses the engine's wasted heat energy (at a temp of 180* F) to boil seawater and claim the distillate, pure potable water. For this process (boiling) to work at 180* F, it is done in a reinforced chamber that has been drawn into a vacuum. This picture is of an evap unit (short for evaporative), aboard a 32,000 ton vessel that only has 105 crew. For the demands on a cruise ship, sometimes both methods are employed.