Depends on where we are traveling but in southern Utah canyon country it is difficult to use any filter in most of the available sources. The silt in the streams plugs up a good filter very fast, before I can pump one gallon. When I clean it it plugs up much faster. So we look for seeps coming out of a wall, don’t have to filter those or a pothole where the water has settled clear I’d one can be found.

Many times we just boil water but the water born pathogens like Cyanobacteria have a toxin that only gets worse when the water is boiled thus rupturing the bacteria and spreading the toxins. That is the problem with the Virgin River where that woman claimed to have been lost and hunkering down for a couple weeks. Without water she would be dead but the Rangers and Sheriff said drinking that water for every a couple days would have the same effect, death.

I have carried 12 liters of water into the desert many times. Lol