Glass of Water

Water. Planet Earth is notorious for having a lot of it. Humans are known to consist mainly of it. All life depends on it. If one of us should forget to imbibe it in one of its many forms for a few days, it's game over. (Luckily our bodies have developed a reminder mechanism called thirst.) Unfortunately not all of us have equal access to it. And to many it's becoming harder to get, as insanely short-sighted farming methods deplete aquifers the world over. The possibility of war over access to water is becoming depressingly plausible.

Runner beans unfurl magically

In rainy Wales such intransigent problems seem almost far-fetched. When living in my caravan I was generally able to meet my drinking water needs by catching rain on the greenhouse roof, collected in a water butt, then manually poured into a gravity filter to eliminate any nasties. This is a vertical metal cylinder, the top half taking the water which slowly drips through two ceramic “candles” with carbon cores, ending up in the bottom half which has a convenient tap. Now I drink the water from the tap outside my dwelling which comes direct from a spring owned by my landlord. Apparently the Environment Agency testers say it's the cleanest you can get. It certainly tastes fine.

The works to replace the safety barrier by my land proceeds apace.

140 years ago the Corporation of Liverpool also had water on its mind. (Not water on its brain, that's something completely different.) The good citizens of Liverpool were increasing in number and all of them, not unreasonably, wanted enough water to drink. As things stood, the wet stuff would be running low as the population burgeoned. So the Corporation cast around for a solution and decided to make a new reservoir. They peered over the border into Wales and saw all the big hills with valleys inbetween, and water, water, water everywhere. They poked around for a while and eventually picked one that seemed suitable. It was big, it had water coming in, and was 68 miles from the city – near enough for transporting it by aqueduct not to be too expensive, and far enough that none of the Liverpudlians themselves would complain about the flooding of a beautiful valley. Granted there was a little village of Welsh people in the valley, but who can stand in the way of progress?

It is still here today, known as Lake Vyrnwy (pronounced Vern-wee I believe) and continues to provide drinking water, though perhaps not just to Liverpool now. At times of drought, the water level drops low enough that some of the drowned village becomes visible. It's about half an hour drive from my place and I made my first visit last Sunday afternoon. You come upon it quite suddenly, after a long twisty lane, the wide expanse of blue and the impressive structure of the dam appearing together, with the road taking you across the dam itself. This is a fundamentally disorientating experience – a lake immediately on your right and nothing immediately on your left. The RSPB are here explaining to anyone who will listen what manner of birdlife is on display. Forests and moorland surround it. It is beautiful and serene, if you can ignore the procession of Triumph classic cars making their Sunday outing. And the ghostly bells of the submerged village church echo around the valley. Well, perhaps.

P.S. My planning officer is visiting me on-site later today to discuss my planning application to keep my polytunnel and greenhouse. A rather important discussion! Stay tuned.