Itineraries

An itinerary is a day-by-day trip through your guide: on each day, the spots, routes and places to visit in order, the travel between them, your notes, and where to sleep. Itineraries are the first box of the Planning page, and each one opens in its own editor.

An itinerary points at the guide's own spots, routes and places and copies nothing from them: correct a spot, and every itinerary that uses it shows the correction. It adds only what belongs to the trip, and it works nothing out for you: no travel times or distances between stops appear unless you write them.

Itineraries are part of the guide's content: on a live guide, buyers see a new itinerary, and every change to one, once you publish (Save, preview and publish). Buyers read itineraries in the guide in their browser; the app has no itinerary screen.

The Itineraries box

The box lists the guide's itineraries in the order buyers see them. Each row shows the name, then the number of days and stops and the way of getting around, as in 3 days · 11 stops · By public transport. A row can also carry a status:

• Archived: buyers do not see the itinerary. See Archive, duplicate or delete.
• Not in the guide yet: no stops, or Not in the guide yet: no stop buyers can open. Buyers see an itinerary only once a day holds a stop they can open: a spot that is not archived, a route or a place. Travel and notes alone do not count.

Before the first itinerary, the box shows No itineraries yet.

New itinerary asks for two things. Name is required, up to 120 characters. Days is how many empty days the trip starts with, from 1 to 30; it suggests 3, and you can add or delete days later. Create adds the itinerary at the end of the list and opens its editor; Cancel closes the dialog.

The editor

The editor is a page of its own, with the form on the left and the live preview on the right (below the form on a narrower screen). Planning at the top takes you back to the Planning page. The line under the name says that buyers see the itinerary once you publish, and Archived, hidden from buyers marks an archived one.

Nothing in the editor saves by itself. While the itinerary has changes, the guide bar at the foot of the page carries its Save, in the place of Preview: it saves the whole itinerary at once, every field and every day, and then the bar says Your changes are saved. and shows Preview again. While changes wait, Publish stays grey. Save stays grey while the itinerary has no name, a note stop has no title, a travel time is not a whole number of minutes from 1 to 4320, or an overnight note waits for its place. The bar then says why in place of its reminder to save, like "Give the itinerary a name." or "Day 2, stop 3: the note needs a title.".

With unsaved changes, Planning, Duplicate, the studio's sidebar and its other links to another page ask first, in Leave without saving?: Save saves the itinerary and goes, Leave drops the changes and goes, Stay keeps you on the page. Save stays grey while the itinerary cannot be saved, like one without a name; if the save fails, you stay on the page and the bar shows the reason. Closing or reloading the browser tab asks too. The browser's back button does not ask, so save before you use it.

If the itinerary changed somewhere else while you edit it, in another tab or because a spot, route, place or its cover photo was deleted, the save stops with "This itinerary changed somewhere else. Reload to continue." Reload the page; changes you had not saved are lost. Without unsaved changes, the editor takes the newer version by itself. One more refusal can come from the save, with Save active until then: a very long itinerary, where the message asks you to shorten the notes or split the trip into two itineraries.

A deleted cover photo leaves the itinerary at once: it goes back to the first spot's photo (Media and photos).

Opening an itinerary that no longer exists, for example from an old link after it was deleted, shows Itinerary not found.

The trip

The first box of the editor describes the whole trip:

The cover

Choose photo opens the image picker, titled Choose the cover. It offers every photo of the guide, the spots' photos included, because only people who bought the guide see its itineraries. Once a photo is chosen, the button reads Change photo, and Use the first spot's photo goes back to the automatic cover.

Without a chosen photo, the cover is the first photo of the itinerary's first spot. The small frame shows that photo faded, with The first spot's photo beside it, or reads No photo yet when buyers get none. Buyers do not get the photos of an archived spot or of a spot whose photos are switched off. A chosen photo of such a spot reads Its spot hides it from buyers beside the buttons, and buyers get the first spot's photo instead; when the first spot's own photos are switched off, they get no cover at all. The live preview shows the cover buyers get. Without any cover, the page opens with its text alone. See Media and photos for the picker.

Days

Each day has a box of its own, numbered in order: Day 1, Day 2. Days take their number from their place, so moving a day renumbers the others.

Add day, under the last day, adds an empty day at the end, up to 30 days.

Stops

A day holds up to 40 stops. Add under a day's stops opens the picker for that day (Add to Day 2); it is grey once the day is full. Its chips, which screen readers call What to add, choose the kind of stop: Spots, Routes, Places, Travel or Note. New stops join the end of the day.

Spots

Spots lists every spot of the guide with its first photo. Tick the ones you want, then Add 1 spot (Add 3 spots for three) adds them in the order you ticked them. Search spots filters the list by title. When you tick more spots than the day has room for, the button goes grey and the picker says how many more the day takes: untick some first.

From a collection adds the spots of a chapter or collection at once, in its order: pick it in the list that reads Pick a chapter or collection, where each one shows its number of spots. It appears once the guide has a collection with spots. When the collection holds more spots than the day has room for, nothing is added yet: its first spots, as many as the day takes, are ticked in the list below, and a line says so, like "Lakes has 30 spots and Day 2 takes 12 more, so its first 12 are ticked below.". Change the ticks if you like, then add them.

An archived spot shows Archived in the list. You can add it, but buyers do not see the stop until you unarchive the spot, and the stop says Archived, hidden from buyers.

Routes and places

Routes lists the guide's routes with their grade, duration, climb and number of spots; Search routes filters them by name, and a click adds one. Places lists the guide's places under their boxes, Stays, Transport and the others; a click adds one. You make routes on the Planning page and places on Helpers.

A route stop opens the route's page under one of the day's spots when the route leads to one, and otherwise under the first spot it leads to. A route stop that says "Leads to no spot, so buyers cannot open it" belongs to a route that leads to no spot buyers see: buyers get its name and numbers, but the row opens nowhere. Link the route to a spot on Planning.

Travel

Travel adds the way from one stop to the next, as you write it. The Travel mode chips show the common modes first, and More shows them all: Car, Bus, Train, Tram, Metro, Cable car, Funicular, Boat, Ferry, Flight, Helicopter, Shuttle, 4x4, Walk, Bike, Taxi or Transfer. Then, all optional:

• Minutes: how long it takes, a whole number from 1 to 4320;
• From and To: where it starts and ends, up to 120 characters each;
• Note: your word on this stretch, like which side to sit on.

Add travel adds it. Buyers see one line on the day's timeline, as in Bus · 45 min · Harbour to Old Town. Travel minutes count toward the day's times, like 1h 10 by train.

Notes

Note adds a stop that is only words: a Title (required, up to 120 characters) and a Text, like a reminder to buy groceries before the shops close. Add note adds it. Buyers see it as a shaded box in the day.

A stop's controls

Each stop shows its photo or an icon, its name, and what it is: the spot's categories, the route's type and duration, the place's type, Travel or Note.

Deleting a spot, route or place from the guide takes its stops out of every itinerary, and the itinerary's editor shows the change.

Overnight

Overnight says where the day ends:

• No overnight, which every new day starts with;
• one of the guide's stays, from the Stays box on Planning;
• Type a place, to write it in words in Place, up to 120 characters.

A stay and a place in words can stand together: type a place first, then pick the stay. Once the day has an overnight, Overnight note adds a line, like a reminder to book ahead. Buyers see the overnight at the foot of the day: the stay's card, the place in words and the note.

The note belongs to a stay or a place: with Type a place chosen and Place empty, a note keeps Save grey until you type the place or choose No overnight. No overnight takes the overnight away: the stay, the place in words and the note. When a stay is deleted from the guide, the overnight keeps its place in words and its note, or goes when it had no place in words.

The live preview

Live preview is a phone showing the itinerary page as buyers see it in the guide, built from your form as it stands, before you save. Its cover and its photos are the ones buyers get (see The cover). Preview theme switches the phone between Light and Dark. It shows the itinerary even while it is archived or holds no stop buyers can open. Nothing on the phone opens. Screen readers call it Itinerary preview.

Archive, duplicate or delete

Archive or delete, at the foot of the editor, folds open on three actions. Each one applies at once, without Save:

The bin on a row of the Itineraries box asks the same question. On a live guide, buyers see an archive, an unarchive or a delete once you publish.

What buyers see

This is the guide in the browser; the app has no itinerary screen. A published itinerary shows in the guide when it is not archived and holds at least one stop buyers can open. Stops on archived spots are left out, and the days keep their numbers.

• Home: a row of itinerary cards, each with its cover, number of days, name and short description. It shows four at most; with more, See all leads to the list of every itinerary.
• The guide's menus: the side rail on a computer and the menu on a phone list every itinerary.
• The itinerary page: the cover with the line of days, getting around and season (like 3 days · By public transport · June to September), the name, the short description and where it starts and ends. Then a bar with Days, Spots, On foot (the time of its hikes, walks and walking travel) and Season, the season note, Before you go, and chips that jump to each day.
• Each day: its number, title and facts (like 4 spots · 3h 30 on foot · 1h 10 by train), its note, the stops on a timeline with the time of day where it changes, the overnight, and Show on the map when the day has spots.
• The stops: a spot opens its page and carries the buyer's heart and Been there marks; a route shows its row and opens its page; a place shows its card; travel shows as one line; a note as a box.
• Show on the map opens the guide map with only that day's spots and the lines of its routes, under a bar that names the day.

The example guide

The example guide's itineraries open read only. Every field shows its value, nothing can be added, moved, saved or deleted, and the live preview works. The line under the name says that the itinerary is part of the example guide.