BERKELEY SPRINGS, W.Va. (WDVM) — Who has the best water in the world? That decision was made on Saturday at the 32nd Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting Festival. Dozens of people came out to learn about safe drinking water and to find out what brand of water is the best of the best. It was hosted by Travel Berkeley Springs.

“Next to air, water keeps us alive. This is the blood of the planet. And when you sort of suddenly look at water differently, you realize it’s a special thing,” said Arthur von Wiesenberger, Water Master for the festival.

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Judges from all over came out to look, taste, and feel different municipal water, bottled water, sparkling water, and carbonated water from across the world.

“We like to bring water into the forefront, you know, to acknowledge that it is our most precious, natural resource, and we really need to all do our best to conserve and protect it,” said Jill Klein Rone, Producer for the festival.

Berkeley Springs water tasting festival is the largest and longest water tasting in the world. 

“People have been coming here for hundreds of years. Native Americans and then, of course, George Washington came when he was just 16 as a surveyor and helped lay out the town, and then he came back with his friends and family to take the waters, and Berkeley Springs blew up. It’s the nation’s oldest spa and our country’s first spa. So water has always been very important to Berkeley Springs. So it was kind of a natural progression to do a water tasting,” said Klein Rone.

This year there was no public tasting due to COVID-19, but that did not stop people from showing up. Not only did guests get some free water, but they also learned about the economic impact.

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“In COVID, the millions 10s of millions of people couldn’t pay their water and sewer bills. So I think it really broad light on where the economics was the water, the affordability of water and how it affects, you know, a huge population demographic of our country,” said water expert Scott Shipe Water.

Watermaster von Wiesenberger also shared what the judges are looking for in the water.

“The first thing is the way it looks when you want water to be perfectly clear and transparent. Nothing floating around it. You really just want to have a perfectly clear water. There’s sulfur which can give the yellow color, certain metals like iron and give it a red color. None of that is what you want and those won’t do very well here in Berkeley Springs. The next thing they do is they smell the water and kind of we were going back to the absence of things you don’t want to have a smell in the water,” said von Wiesenberger.

“A lot of municipal water for example has smells like mostly chlorine. So if they take a sniff of a water and it smells like a swimming pool, it’s not going to do very well here. Algae can give water a swampy smell and low grade plastics can give the water plastic aroma, not good. Then they taste the water, you have about 100,000 taste buds in your mouth and they pick up different sides of things like sweetness, sourness bitterness. The mouthfeel is also important how it feels in your mouth does it strip your mouth of all its natural salinity because it’s got a low pH therefore it’s more acidic or does it kind of feel more complete in your mouth more balanced and that would be a result of a higher pH,” said von Wiesenberger

Klein Rone said this festival makes a difference in several businesses.

“It’s really gratifying to us to be able to help provide that economic development throughout the world, as well as like I said, here, you know, in the United States and really recognizing the quality work,” she said.

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Originally Appeared Here