a loop of string makes a bottle loop

I don't know if I'd trust this for an aluminum bottle because of the small lip, but it looks pretty good on the plastic bottles where there's a decent sized flange.

If you have a case of bottled water and some cord, knot them along the cord like Christmas tree bulbs and tie them around your waist.

Sue

I have a knack for pointing out the obvious. This knot would come in handy if you found a discarded plastic bottle you needed to use as an emergency water bottle. thanks for the link. Will practice with it tonight.

Last year I started googling around to learn how to tie the jug sling. With the exception of above instructable, I found less than a handfull usable and correct tutorials. After a month of practice (which also included The Axis Bend – an Alternative Bottle Sling by Dick Clements ) I have come to the conclusion that while kind of pretty, I'll never use either again. They're just too complicated to remember, and too complicated to tie.

What would I use instead? Two overhand knots, or two double-overhand knots, or get this, four knots. I've only tested this with nice lips on plastic water/soda bottles (500ml/2liter) and even 5 gallon water cooler bottle. For the heavier bottles I recommend adding a kilick hitch around the body (a timber hitch followed by half hitch).

The neatest arrangement I found is to tie a slip knot (two half-hitches) on each end of a cordage, and then tighten over the bottle. See attached 2slip-loop-bottle-sling.png

With the type of bottle you show in your illustration, I would suspect a prusik, essentially a doubled or tripled girth hitch, would also work fairly well.

Another handy trick is to take two socks, stockings and tie them together, or use a set of pantyhose, as a carrier for two bottles. If they are slit vertically near the top the bottles stay inside and the slit stays closed. A pair of bottles on each end the pair can be carried over a shoulder or around the neck.

Over the shoulder even a pair of two liter bottles can be easily carried without excessive wear or fatigue. Pantyhose are quite strong and will stretch to accommodate larger loads.

If your traveling over uneven terrain connecting the toes of the legs will help control the load and help preserve stability.

Agreed. Although I learnt that Jug knot, and think it's a fun knot, I've pretty much forgotten it again as it's too specialised. I frequently carry a bottle on a length of chord, and I just use a Constrictor knot or a Clove Hitch. A Constrictor knot is very secure and tight even on bottles that don't have much of a lip. I started using a Clove Hitch (on bottles with a lip) because Constrictor could be a bit inconvenient to undo.

They are both general knots, and 2 of the 5 or so that everyone should know. (The others are Figure-of-Eight, Tape knot and probably Bowline.)

Yeah, I bet that clove hitch would be enough for a lipped water bottle. Gonna give it a try in future.

I'd recommend 2 round turns and two half-hitches to secure a line around the neck of a water bottle.