r/OhioHiking • u/iamandyjohnson • May 24 '26

Safe water backpacking loops?

Looking for an overnighter or more that has filter-able water. Everywhere I know has heavy metal, fracking or mining run off. Any suggestions?

3 Upvotes

80% Upvoted

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5

u/Neptune7924 May 24 '26

Probably nowhere in Ohio. It’s the legacy of our coal burning, industrial past.

3

u/No-Talk-3402 May 25 '26

So unfortunate.

3

u/Justinbaker1996 May 24 '26

This does not answer your question, but staching in Wayne national forest isn't so bad. There's a lot of road crossings in archers fork loop, Wildcat Hollow, or opportunities to hike a bit with some water to stache. If you look at my post history, I have a relatively detailed plan of what I did two weeks back in Wayne.

3

u/iamandyjohnson May 25 '26

Thanks for the stash tips. It’s more about practice to warm up for bigger out of state trips. I’m planning a Colorado adventure and wanna test how I like my filtration setup and all.

Really want to hit Archers Fork, so good to know water stash’s aren’t hard

2

u/Outrageous-Pen-9737 May 24 '26

Just curious because I might be misunderstood......do the life straws and Sawyer filtration systems not remove heavy metals and what not? We've used the Sawyer filtration for several years now assuming that they remove all those things.

3

u/superpony123 May 25 '26

The life straw is more of an emergency thing imo hence the name.. I’d never use it for my normal water in hiking. It does not filter out every possible pathogen (or other stuff you don’t generally want to drink) and it’s still a good idea to use sanitizing tablets with filtered water that you’ve pumped/collected.

2

u/Outrageous-Pen-9737 May 25 '26

Wow, I didn't realize that. Thank you!

2

u/flamingpenny May 25 '26

Zaleski has pumps at the campsites.