What this is
Hikr is a trail roulette. You say how long you've got and what you're in the mood for, and it spins up one real trail or park near you. It's a side project, built for fun and for getting people outside.
How the settings work
⏱ I've got… (time)
How long you want to spend walking on the trail. Getting to the trailhead is not included. The card shows the travel time separately, so add the two together when you plan your day.
Hikr favours hikes that fill that time. If a trail is longer, it tells you where to turn around. Times assume a relaxed pace (about 4.5 km/h on easy ground, slower on rough trail) plus extra for hills: roughly an hour for every 600 m you climb.
🚗 I'm up for… (how far)
How far away the start can be, measured in a straight line from you:
- Walking distance: start within 3.0 km (≈40 min on foot)
- A short drive: start within 15 km (≈35 min drive)
- A road trip: start within 40 km (≈1h 25m drive)
Drive times are rough guesses. Winding roads and traffic can make them longer.
🌲 I want… (vibe)
Worked out from trail and park names and map tags, so treat it as a good guess:
- Trees: forests, woods, and most dirt trails
- Water: lakes, rivers, creeks, beaches, waterfronts
- A view: peaks, ridges, buttes, lookouts
- An easy stroll: parks and paved paths
💪 I'm feeling… (effort)
Based on how far you'll walk and how much you'll climb, using the rating Shenandoah National Park publishes for its hikes:
- lazy: mostly flat, e.g. 5.0 km with 30 m of climbing
- like a sweat: you'll feel it, e.g. 6.5 km with 240 m of climbing
- like suffering: a proper day out, e.g. 13 km with 760 m of climbing
Short windows rarely reach the harder levels, since effort grows with distance. If nothing nearby matches, Hikr shows the closest and says so.
🕘 Going… (when)
Right now uses the current weather and today's sunset. Later today (about three hours out), tomorrow morning and this weekend (the next Saturday or Sunday at 9 AM) use the hourly forecast for that time instead: rain chance, temperature, and that day's sunset.
For a future time, the hike's button becomes Plan it. That saves it to your passport with the date rather than stamping it as done.
📍 Location
Hikr checks your location every time you spin, so it follows you around. If you type a place instead, it sticks with that place until you switch back to “Use my location”.
🌦 Weather and daylight
When it's raining, Hikr leans toward sheltered, tree-covered trails over exposed viewpoints. When it's hot, it leans toward shade and water. Hikes you'd finish after sunset get pushed down the list.
Stay safe out there
Hikr is a suggestion engine, not a guide. Trails come from OpenStreetMap, a map anyone can edit. The data can be incomplete, outdated or simply wrong, and Hikr can't know about closures, washouts, fires, wildlife, private land or today's conditions.
- Check with the land manager or park for closures and rules before you go.
- Respect private property and posted signs, even if a path is on the map.
- Distances, climbs, times and difficulty are estimates. Plan with margin.
- Carry water, a light and a charged phone, and tell someone where you're going.
- Compass mode points in a straight line. Follow real trails, not the needle.
- Turn around if the weather turns, it's getting dark, or it doesn't feel right.
Hikr is provided as-is, without warranty of any kind. You're responsible for your own safety and for deciding whether a hike is right for you.
Your location & privacy
To find trails, your location goes to Hikr's server, which looks up the area on OpenStreetMap. Hikr doesn't save it anywhere. Like any website, the hosting provider (Vercel) keeps short-lived request logs, which include the address you requested and your IP. Weather and elevation requests go straight from your browser to Open-Meteo.
Your passport, saved hikes and hidden hikes live only in this browser (local storage). There are no accounts. Shared links don't include your location.
Hikr counts page visits with Vercel Web Analytics, which uses no cookies and doesn't identify you. Location never goes into those counts: it's stripped from page addresses before anything is sent.
Where the data comes from
- Trails, parks, trailheads and map tiles: © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database License.
- Weather, sunset and elevation: Open-Meteo (CC BY 4.0).
- Place search: Nominatim, run by the OpenStreetMap Foundation.
- Difficulty uses Shenandoah National Park's hike rating; hiking times use Naismith's rule.