Several San Francisco, California hotels promoted World Water Day - March 22 in collaboration with Blue Planet Run Foundation this past weekend. The book, Blue Planet Run: The Race To Provide Safe Drinking Water To The World, was placed in luxury suites as a gift to guests staying over the weekend.

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Many of us have a large circle of friends, coworkers and family members that seems to grow wider each year. As our gift list grows longer, holiday time can bring with it a sense of environmental dread. The excess packaging, wrapping paper, bows, tape, and whatnots. The time spent searching for the perfect gift for folks who likely have just about everything they need or want. (How many re-giftable items do you receive each year?) Then you buy a couple of extra gifts just in case there is somebody you might have forgotten and you want to avoid that awkward moment of the one-sided gift exchange! Ugh.

Consider making this holiday season low impact and no-stress by joining the Blue Planet Run Holiday Gift of Water program.

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It’s not too late to register. You can join a team, form a team or go solo. Cover the miles however you’d like! http://www.blueplanetrun.org/30-mile

One of the Tanzanian schools sent out a message that the 30-Mile Challenge participants can read before they start their 30-mile run, walk or cycling. Blue Planet Run is working to build communication bridges between the athletes and the communities that benefit from their efforts.

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Run, Walk or Cycle 30 miles within 30 days starting October 1 to provide safe drinking water to 1,200 kids for life! Register now, it’s easy. You can form a team, find a team or go solo. Cover all of your 30 miles in one shot or spread it out over the entire month! Go to: http://www.blueplanetrun.org/30-mile

This is a great reason to start getting into shape. If you are already an athlete, just do what you are doing and apply it to this very worthy cause! We need 1,000 athletes to join Team Blue with a pledge of $1/mile. Help us by spreading the word. You can download a flyer from our website under “what more you can do.”

Currently, these kids miss school and walk long distances to find and collect water. They often resort to a hand-dug open pit used by animals and people. The water is filthy! They get sick and miss even more school. With a well, these kids are given a proper education; they are healthy; they can grow their own vegetables!

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We have been in awe of Katie Spotz for quite some time for all that she does for Blue Planet Run. She ran as part of a four-person team for the Blue Planet Run 24-hour trail relay last spring; she is training to row across the Atlantic by herself next year; and she has just accomplished her latest amazing feat in the name of safe drinking water…

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This guest post comes to us from the Blue Planet Run Foundation.

Annette Fay visited Blue Planet Run’s project in Kisii, a crowded town nestled on top of a hilly, green part of the Kenyan countryside. The news from the completed water project demonstrates just how immense the impact of safe drinking water can be on a community. Annette shares her story:

I met with the Hospital Superintendent Dr. Otomu, the District Water Engineer Mr. Orangi and the Head Nurse Mrs. Monayo, the latter two walked me through the project.

The 200 bed Kisii District Hospital serves 525,000 people directly and is a referral facility for an additional 2,430,000, as far south as the Tanzanian border and west as Lake Victoria’s south-eastern shore. The Kisii area has a high density of HIV/AIDS victims and is known for the prevalence of the deadly highlands malaria after the rainy season.  The hospital’s water needs are 180,000 litres per day. Before the water project, if all systems were functioning properly, the hospital had 40,000 litres of water per day from the following sources: 15,000 from a borehole, 10,000 litres from rainwater harvesting and 15,000 litres from the municipal water system.

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Water is on the tip of everybody’s tongue these days. America is facing major crises with floods in some regions, hundreds of wild fires in others, and droughts throughout. As horrible as all of that may sound, the majority of us can all still go to our faucet and access safe and clean drinking water without a whole lot of effort. Not the case for many people worldwide.

Fact: 1.1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water.

Fact: Countless women and children walk on average 4 miles just to fetch a jug of water that is not guaranteed to be safe to drink.

Fact: $30 provides one person with a lifetime of safe drinking water.

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Why would women need to gather to discuss the topic of water?

• Pastoral women wake up at pre-dawn hours to walk great distances in order to collect water and relieve themselves. By midday they must walk out into the desert at a greater distance to avoid being seen, often returning ashamed and sometimes soiled.
• Water privatization makes water inaccessible to most because it raises prices. Male water vendors dominate the communal water points, so women have to wait in long lines. Women get beaten if it takes too long to return home, accused by the husbands that they are cheating on them.
• Desperate women exchange sex for water to avoid the line.

Every single women agreed, and took for granted, that water is their responsibility and that it’s a problem.

The AWWC, held in Kenya, was comprised of 30 women from all over Africa. These women were eager to learn and share with their communities. The five-day schedule was packed, going well into the evening. Between activities women broke into song and dance. They learned how to implement new technologies, write business plans, test water’s safety, and use the Peer Water Exchange collaborative model. The women were excited to join a global network and liked that the PWX application is standardized.

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