Cruisers Rally Brings Potable Water to Islanders

Byline: Capt. Pat Rains This year’s cruising rally to El Salvador has public service as its goal. A project called “Just Water” is aimed at donating special drinking-water filter kits to 260 impoverished residents of El Cordoncillo. Although the Bahia del Sol hotel and marina have their own generators and water systems, the village on the barrier island around them has no sewers, no electricity and no potable water. “For the 2012 rally, we formed a project called Just Water that will provide clean water to the island by giving each family a water-filtering system,” said Jean Strain, organizer of the annual spring rally to Central America. “We are working with Homespun Environmental, a company that specializes in water-filtering components. They made a Cruisers Rally kit for us.” She said each kit costs about $26 after a discount and consists of a pre-filter sock, a ceramic filter, a special siphon, a spigot and two large buckets. Strain said the cost of shipping the components from the U.S. to El Salvador would be prohibitive, even without the buckets, which can be purchased locally for an additional $3. So, the rally needs to raise at least $2,700 to buy the drinking-water filtering kits, plus $1,500 a year...