I stopped by a known water source shown on the Jonathan Ley (JL) map. Over thanksgiving I was very comfortable dropping a line from my 1.3 pound pump filter into this little pond surrounding by cow droppings with bees swarming around it, but I was nervous about dipping a bottle in and using my new 2 ounce Sawyer filter. Since I had plenty of water already, I moved on.
Its a big climb up Jacks and Burro peak. I went looking for water at Mud Spring, but couldn’t find it. The CDT Hiker app on my iPhone (made by a company called GutHook) didn’t seem to be able to show my location. This was strange because it uses GPS and had worked great over Thanksgiving. Fortunately I have another iPhone app called SpyGlass that always shows the GPS coordinates. I used those coordinates with the Bear Creek maps to find my location and get me to Mud Spring. The water was kinda lower with leaves and bugs in it. I used a bandana as a filter and bleach to purify. I then put the Sawyer filter on my Platypus bottle to sip from. I settled down for a dinner before heading downhill.
It was now dark and I followed down Deadman Gulch the best I could with a headlamp on. Its a bit treacherous with loose soil on steep downhill grades and plenty of things to trip and stumble over. I eventually made it down to a road where I camped.