Water
Water – beautiful, powerful and crucial to life on Earth. The earthly treasure that we cannot
live without, carefully collected, guarded and savoured by small and large alike.
75% of our planet’s surface is covered by water – the greatest of Earthly treasures.
At the poles where temperatures plummet – this water freezes and becomes the landscape.
Elsewhere water forms great oceans. Trapped in this liquid world are a myriad of different life
forms – from the microscopic to the impossibly large – all dependent on the oceans’ water for
oxygen and each providing another with food in an intricate web of life.
From the oceans come the water that gives life on land. Water evaporates from the sea
surface and condenses into tiny droplets in the sky as clouds. But clouds don’t always drop
their water on land. They often evaporate in the sun – leaving parts of the world dry – in
places permanently.
The absence or presence of water governs life on land. It determines where and how
animals live. Every year millions of wildebeest move across Africa in pursuit of seasonal
rains and the grass that they provide.
But falling rain is not always welcome. The power of water is immense. Once on land, it
begins its journey back to the sea, carving its way through the earth. Over millennia rivers
have made huge waterfalls and sculpted landscapes like the Grand Canyon.
65 % of the human body is water. It is our absolute necessity – we cannot live without it. We
need it for drinking, for bathing and to grow food. And we have gone to great lengths to get it
to where we want it to be.
Water the giver of life – essential to all – and forever sacred.