How to Travel with Pool Water & Silica
If you've been following me for a while, you know I can't live without my silica water and pool water. Not even for a few days. The difference in quality of life is just too great.
Figuring out how to travel with my water for three weeks took some of my brain energy to figure out. But I did it. Last night I went to bed at 12:30 am and woke up at 5:30 am.
I also started wearing the stem cell activation patches three weeks ago, but those are a snap to pack – they are literally just sleeves of stickers, so no big whoop.
But the water was another matter. Water is also really important when you are on the patches. If you're not properly hydrated, the patches will not work. They tell us to drink half of our weight in ounces per day. For me, that's a little over 2 liters a day.
So, ideally, I like to drink 1 liter of pool water (water with chlorine dioxide added) and 1 liter of silica water. When I do this, I only have to sleep 5 hours a night to feel fully rested, and I have loads more energy. I also don't get sick – no matter how many sick people are around me.
In this post, I break down for you what I decided to do in terms of how to make the water on my trip and how it's going. I also share some tips and tricks for packing and tools to use. And how to handle breakdowns and mishaps along the way.
No Jet Lag!
Oh, and I have to tell you, when you are on pool water and silica water and sleeping less (I only sleep 5 hours a night,) you literally have ZERO issues with jet lag.
I normally feel very tired when I come to Europe, and need to take a nap after my flight, and I sleep a lot the first night.
That did not happen this time. I slept 5 hours on the flight, and I slept very soundly.
Normally I don't sleep well at all sitting upright on an airplane. I fell asleep watching a movie and woke up 4 hours later. Looked at the time, went back to sleep, and woke up when they started serving breakfast.
And in the morning I was wide awake, full of energy, and never needed a nap the whole first day in Europe. Enjoyed a nice dinner that night and went to bed after 10 pm with no issues. Amazing!
Bottom line: I will never travel without pool water and silica water again.
Pool Water: CDS or MMS?
First, I needed to decide how to make the pool water: CDS (Chl0rine Di0xide Solution) or MMS?
At home, I normally make the pool water the Andreas Kalcker way, which is called CDS – Chlorine Dioxide Solution – as opposed to the Jim Humble method of making MMS drops.
The CDS requires refrigeration. So I knew that would not be possible on my trip. So far I've stayed in 3 different places and the bed and breakfast I'm at now is the first one I've stayed that has a fridge – and it's in the kitchen downstairs.
I never made MMS before until this spring. We went camping for spring break, and I knew I couldn't make the CDS for the week we were in the tent. So I decided to try making the drops.
I did that for several weeks in the spring, just to see how it worked. The only negative issue I had was loose stool but I think that's because I was taking too much of the activated drops.
After weeks of testing, I decided I prefer the Andreas Kalcker CDS method. You can see the recipe for this, as well as how to make the MMS drops, on this post: How To Make Pool Water.
How to Make MMS on the Road
Jim Humble recommends making the MMS fresh every time, and consuming it 8 times a day.
I'll be honest, that is too much trouble for me. And I'll be honest, if it's too much of a hassle, I won't do it.
And I was right... after my first three days of trying this out in Europe, it was a disaster. I was not able to make the pool water throughout the day.
I was gone most of the day, in cathedrals, on walking tours, and it would have been a pain to carry the bottles. I didn't bring a backpack – just a small crossbody and I also have to carry my camera.
And as a result of not drinking the pool water often enough, I resorted back to needing eight hours of sleep at night. I would wake up after five hours of sleep, and found myself hitting the snooze button over and over.
This never happens when I am drinking the pool water!
So the day before yesterday I realized what I could is mix up a big batch of pool water in a liter bottle (thankfully I brought an extra liter-sized Nalgene bottle) and just sip it throughout the day.
This is the Jim Humble activated drops method so it does not need to be refrigerated. You can find the recipe on my pool water page: How To Make Pool Water.
All you do is activate the drops in a shot glass and then add it to a liter of water.
I looked it up in Humble's MMS book and he says to drink 8 glasses of water a day with 3 activated drops of MMS in each glass.
Again, I can't do that when I'm out and about in cathedrals and castles. So I did the math and 3 drops x 8 = 24 activated drops.
I don't have a dropper (forgot to bring one,) only a plastic syringe, and it's hard to do drops with that.
So I looked it up... 20 drops = 1 ounce. Sorry! This was a mistake. One of my readers just notified me. I meant to say 1 ml.
So I got 1/2 ml of sodium chlorite and put it in my shot glass (I brought a shot glass with me) and then 1/2 ml of hydrochloric acid and added it to the shot glass.
I let it activate for a minute, then added it to my Nalgene liter bottle full of water. (You can use silica water for this – see below for how to make the silica water.)
Then I sip that throughout the day, also sipping another liter or two of silica water.
Next I will explain how I am making the silica water for travel...
So, all you need to make this recipe is:
- Water purification drops: Part A: Sodium Chlorite and Part B: Hydrochloric Acid – .5 ml of each
- Shot glass
- Plastic syringe
- Non BPA plastic or glass 1 liter size bottle you can use to drink throughout the day
- Filtered water or silica water (see below) but if you have to, you can use plain unfiltered tap water because the MMS will latch on to toxins and take them out of your body.
How to Make Silica Water Solution for Travel
I brought three things to make silica water on the road:
- Pre-made silica solution (I'll explain how I did that in a minute)
- Shot glass to measure the silica solution (one shot glass is about an ounce – I marked mine with permanent marker for .5 and 1 ounce).
- Small 14 oz bottle (mine is Nalgene) to store the silica solution
- Half-gallon sized non-BPA plastic bottle to mix the silica water.
- Ideally, also: filter to filter the silica water after you prepare it. This didn't really work out for me due to the travel filter I bought, which I will explain in a minute.
How I Made the Silica Water Solution
I made this solution before I left home.
I used Dennis Crouse's recipe for silica water, which makes one gallon of silica water. I wanted to make a starter solution for the silica water, which I could add to a half gallon bottle of water.
His recipe calls for 1/8 cup (1 ounce) of water plus the 3 ingredients. I figured I could use that as my "starter" (like sourdough bread) and then I'd have 14 one-ounce starters for 14 gallons of water.
I brought a half-gallon travel water bottle (because one gallon is too big to carry), so I can make 28 half-gallon batches, which is more than enough for my 22 day trip.
Recipe to Make Silica Soution for Travel
So here are the steps (which is basically just Dennis's recipe – links to all the ingredients are on my silica water recipe – and you can find dash/smidgen measuring spoons on Amazon):
- In a glass Pyrex measuring cup, measure 1/8 cup (1 ounce) of spring water or filtered water and add one dash (1/8 teaspoon, 0.83 gram) plus two smidgens (3/16 of a teaspoon, 600mg) of hydrous powdered sodium silicate.
- Put in the microwave or on the stove for 1 minute (needs to boil for 30 seconds).
- Add 1 dash (1/8 teaspoon, 0.83 gram) of sodium bisulfate and 2 smidgens of baking soda and stir.
- Add to 14-ounce plastic bottle.
- Do this 12 times to make a total of 14 ounces.
- Seal tightly, and double wrap in plastic Ziplock freezer bags and store in your checked bag. They will not let you carry this on, so you will need to check your bag. (Totally worth it to me if I can sleep only 5 hours a night instead of 8!)
How to Filter Your Silica Water on the Road
Ideally you should filter this through a gravity filter when you add each half ounce of the silica solution to the half-gallon of water.
However, I did not find a travel-friendly version of this. I am using this Berkey Sport Filter, but I can't say that it's really working for me.
For one thing, you can only sip out of it; you can't pour. So this is a problem if you want to use your silica water to make pool water on the road.
I like the fact that it has a plastic loop at the top so I can carry it, similar to a Nalgene bottle.
However, the other problem with this filter is it is very leaky. I've tried six ways to Sunday to remedy the leak, but I can't solve it. They need to fix this.
I am now using the liter Nalgene bottle for my pool water (which I make with silica water). The MMS purifies the water, so I'm not too concerned that I am not filtering it.
How to Make Silica Water and Pool Water on the Road: The Process
Here's my process every morning:
- Mix up 1/2 gallon of silica water using 1/2 gallon of tap water from the hotel sink and 1/2 ounce of silica solution. You can use the shot glass to measure 1/2 ounce of silica solution.
- Add 1 liter of the silica water from the 1/2 gallon bottle to the Sport Berkey – sip that throughout the day.
- Activate 1 ounce (20 drops) of MMS in a shot glass. Add 1 liter of the silica water to the liter-sized Nalgene bottle and then add the activated drops.
- Sip pool water and silica water throughout the day. I carry both bottles on my backpack, and keep them in the car when I'm driving.
I try to drink 1 liter of pool water plus at least 1 liter of silica water throughout the day.
The Berkey Sport only contains 22 ounces (less than a liter) so I either fill that up twice, or I drink one of those, plus a liter of store-bought silica water (see below for European and American brand recommendations).
It is imperative to drink this much since I need around 70 ounces of water a day to keep my LifeWave patches activated – and this also ensures that I only need 5 hours of sleep at night.
Alternative to or Addition to Making Your Own Silica Water: Brand Recommendations for Store-bought Silica Water
If you don't want to go to the trouble of making your own silica water while on the road, you can buy silica water.
Fiji Water in the USA
It's relatively easy to find Fiji water in the United States. You can also buy it on Amazon.
Fiji is one of the bottled mineral waters with the highest amount of silica: 86 mg per liter.
European Mineral Water Highest in Silica
You never know what you are going to get in restaurants or if you can find a supermarket, so that is why I opted to bring my own homemade silica solution.
However, I like the taste of mineral water, so I am also drinking high-silica mineral water when I can.
Here are some of the mineral waters in France with the highest amount of silica:
- Châteldon : 110 mg
- Salvetat : 72 mg
- Badoit : 35 mg
- Volvic : 32 mg
- Évian : 15 mg
These are just the mineral waters high in silica in France. Here's a chart of mineral waters in Europe – you can sort it to show the ones that are highest in silica.
I was thrilled to find La Salvetat at the grocery store in Orléans, so I bought a case. I've already finished half of it in just a couple days. Gonna buy more!
A Warning
When packing, make sure you double or triple wrap all your liquids in freezer bags.
I made the rookie mistake of putting both my sodium chlorite and my hydrochloric acid in the same freezer bag. Oops.
The lids are not as secure as I would have liked, and they leaked a bit and made activated drops within the bag.
No big deal, I just used some of it to clean my Invisalign trays and used the rest in my bath.
That's it! Please let me know if you have any questions.