Creating a trip
How to create, configure, and manage trips in Trailkeep.
A trip is the central object in Trailkeep. It holds your itinerary, GPX route, waypoints, gear list, safety contacts, and trail notes — everything that belongs to a single outing in one place.
Create a new trip
From the dashboard, click New trip. You will be prompted for:
- Trip name — anything descriptive (e.g. "West Highland Way 2026")
- Start date — the day you head out
- End date — the day you expect to return or finish
After the trip is created you can optionally add:
- Trail name and trail URL — links to the route page on AllTrails, Komoot, or similar
- Description — free text notes about the trip
Setting accurate dates matters for the safety system. The end date is what triggers overdue alerts for free accounts. Without an end date, automatic monitoring cannot activate.
Trip status
A trip has three statuses. Status does not change automatically based on dates — you control it manually:
- Planning — the default state; full editing available
- Active — set this when you hit the trail; starts the safety timer and sends your shared link live
- Completed — set this on return; cancels monitoring and closes the trip
To change status, use the status button inside the trip or the trip card menu.
Once a trip is set to Active, the shared edit link is locked — collaborators can no longer make changes. The trip owner can still edit. This prevents accidental changes to a live plan.
Days and itinerary
Each trip is made up of days. A day groups your waypoints for that stage of the route. You can:
- Add as many days as your trip requires
- Name each day (e.g. "Day 1 — Fort William to Kinlochleven")
- Mark a day as complete during the trip
- Reorder days using the up/down arrows on each day header
Reordering days
Use the up / down arrows on a day header to move that day earlier or later in the itinerary. The arrows are always visible on both desktop and mobile.
Waypoints within a day follow their day — they are not independently reordered by position. To insert a waypoint between two existing ones, use the + button that appears between waypoint rows (see Waypoints).
Trip summary
The trip summary card appears at the top of the Trip Planner and shows your total trip distance, broken down by day.
The summary uses a stacked bar chart — a horizontal bar divided into proportional segments per day, with a list of days and their distances below it. There is no alternative chart view (the pie chart is Pack Planner only).
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Currency selector | Sets the currency symbol for waypoint costs across the trip |
| Distance unit | Sets the display unit (km or mi) |
| Route preview (map icon) | Opens the GPX route map overlay — only visible if a GPX file is attached |
Clicking a day row in the breakdown scrolls the planner down to that day.
When you create a new trip, it inherits the distance unit and currency from whichever trip is currently open. If no trip is open, units default to your locale.
Linking a gear list
Every trip can be linked to a list from your Pack Planner. Once linked, the list is accessible from the trip view and is included when you share the trip publicly.
To link a list, open the Gear tab inside the trip and select an existing list or create a new one.
Deleting a trip
Open the three-dot menu on the trip card and select Delete. Deletion is permanent and removes all associated days, waypoints, GPX data, trail notes, and the shared link.