When I go camping, hiking, or even for a road trip, I always bring along a Sawyer water filter. I also bring along plenty of water, so frankly I've hardly used the thing beyond initial testing to make sure I was comfortable handling it. Which I was, because here's how you use a Sawyer S3 Water Filter:

1. Fill the bottle with up to 20 ounces of water
2. Attach the filter to the top of the bottle
3. Squeeze and swirl the flexible bottle for about 10 seconds
4. Drink right from the tip of the filter or squeeze purified water into a vessel of your choice.

Got all that? Good.

As simple as the process of using a Sawyer water filter is, there's a lot going on behind the scenes.

The company's proprietary hollow fiber filter system was developed based on research into kidney dialysis technology, and the filters represent some of the most effective water purifying hardware around. Sawyer filters purify water down to the 0.1 micron level; for reference, a single micron measures about 0.0004 inches. The average human hair is some 75 microns in diameter. So to purify down to one-tenth of one micron is... amazing. And reassuring. I would feel more than confident dipping my Sawyer bottle into any puddle anywhere, or any stream, lake, river, or under any city tap, and drinking the water that flowed through the filter.

Click here to read the full article by Steven John, Insider Picks.