The map on every trip page shows your stops as numbered markers, with route lines connecting them in order. Here’s what each line type means.
Numbered markers
Every trip stop gets a numbered marker matching its position in the itinerary. Number 1 is your first stop, number 2 is the second, and so on. Reordering stops updates the numbers automatically.
Solid gold lines: driveable routes
Between consecutive stops, the system fetches a road-following route from OpenRouteService and draws it as a solid gold line. The line follows actual roads — highways, dirt roads, established tracks — not straight-line as-the-crow-flies.
This works for any pair of stops that can be driven between, including long distances. Single legs up to about 6,000 km are supported. Longer legs are too far for one routing request and will show as dashed lines (see below).
Dashed gray lines: no driveable route
If the routing service can’t find a road connection between two stops, that leg shows as a dashed gray line. Common reasons:
- The two points are on different continents (e.g. North to South America — there’s no road through the Darién Gap)
- A stop is on an island with no ferry data
- A stop is placed in the middle of nowhere with no road within 350m
The dashed line is the honest signal: “you’ll need to figure this leg out yourself” — boat, ferry, container ship, etc.
Custom POI markers
Any custom POIs you’ve added (see Custom Links and POIs) appear on the map alongside the stop markers, with emoji icons matching their type. Click any POI marker for its detail popup.
What happens when you reorder
The route is cached server-side per trip. When you reorder stops, the cache is invalidated and re-fetched on the next page load — so the map always reflects the current stop order, but you don’t pay the routing cost on every page view.
Map controls
- Zoom in/out — top-left buttons or scroll wheel (after clicking the map)
- Full-screen — corner button
- + POI — top-right (when you can edit; see Custom Links and POIs)
If the map shows all straight lines
Either no routing API key is configured (admin task) or every leg failed to route. The straight lines are the fallback — informationally correct, just less detailed than road-following lines.