Find your next send. A map-first, community-powered climbing guide that feels like AllTrails for the vertical world — joyful, radically simple, and obsessively focused on trust & safety.
"Kids climb here. Every photo and route is reviewed." — CragTrails Trust & Safety banner
🚀 Live Demo — Try it now (CragTrails on custom domain) | Deploy your own**
Live Demo (recommended):
→ https://businessdelegate.com (custom domain on Vercel)
(Deployed by the project owner on Vercel)
One-click deploy your own instance:
After deploying your own copy, update the link above in this README and push.
The project is 100% compatible with Vercel (Next.js 16 + zero config).
For complete deployment instructions (CLI, env vars, custom domains, troubleshooting), see: → docs/DEPLOYMENT.md
Local development:
npm run devOpen http://localhost:3000.
Real Authentication (Apple, Google, Facebook, Email)
CragTrails now supports real login via Clerk:
- Copy
.env.example→.env.local - Sign up at clerk.com (free tier is generous)
- Enable Google, Apple, Facebook, and Email (magic links) providers
- Add your
NEXT_PUBLIC_CLERK_PUBLISHABLE_KEYandCLERK_SECRET_KEYto.env.local - Restart the dev server
You will then see proper social + email login flows instead of the demo profiles.
What you'll experience immediately:
- Real-time search that filters both the list and the interactive map
- "Near Me" (50-mile radius) using your browser geolocation
- Grade-colored markers (green = easy, red = hard) with intelligent clustering at low zoom
- Click anything → live preview card → beautiful full modal with "Log this ascent" (joyful toast feedback)
- All filters and selections sync instantly between list and map
This is not a static landing page. It is a working prototype of the core discovery experience.
The project is in an active multi-agent refinement phase under Skeptical CEO oversight.
Major recent progress:
- Full shift to clean light theme (Mountain Project / TheCrag inspired — warm off-whites, forest greens, excellent readability).
- Proper desktop website experience (top navigation on large screens, wider layouts, better use of space) while keeping the excellent mobile 4-tab experience.
- Canonical attributed data model fully wired (real OpenBeta-aligned data + visible source badges).
- High-quality real climbing photos integrated across cards, modals, and logbook.
- Clean 4-tab AllTrails-style navigation (Discover / Map / Logbook / Me).
- Personalized recommendations (location-based "Near You" + history-based "Recommended for you").
- Basic multi-profile demo system + real Clerk auth foundation (Apple/Google/Facebook/Email).
- Minimal tasteful partners section in Me tab ("core always free").
Live Demo → https://businessdelegate.com (custom domain on Vercel)
The prototype is rapidly moving from phone-first dark app → premium light-themed website that works beautifully on both desktop and mobile.
Governance All work goes through the Skeptical CEO process. Only changes with strong Proof of Value (real climber problem, 10yo simplicity test, growth evidence, no simpler alternative) get merged.
Core will always be free. We are deliberately building something special, not another bloated side project.
- Wire the canonical data model + seed into the running UI
- Add real auth + synced logbook (Clerk + Postgres or better)
- Lightweight offline support + the cheapest possible premium unlock
- Real OpenBeta import pipeline (respecting their CC0 model)
- Continue the skeptical CEO process for every new feature
We would rather ship nothing than ship something mediocre.
Built by Skeptical Agents. Governed for the long term.
A premium, calm interface with a sticky header containing the CragTrails logo, global search bar ("Search routes, crags, grades (V4, 5.12...)"), Near Me toggle, and Reset.
Below: A hero statement "Find your next send." + a short explainer box titled "WHY THIS BEATS PURE LIST OR PURE MAP" that references AllTrails' success and the climber-specific "What's on the way?" use case (e.g., driving Bishop → Yosemite and discovering hidden boulders 11 miles off the highway).
The main view is a responsive grid:
- Left (list panel): Scrollable cards showing route name, crag, type, grade badge (color-matched), stars, popularity ("sends"), and distance when Near Me is active. Active selection is highlighted.
- Right (map panel): The full
CragMapcomponent — Leaflet-powered with OpenStreetMap tiles. Circle markers sized by popularity, colored by objective difficulty. Clusters at low zoom expand on click. Beautiful legend in bottom-right. Subtle "Click markers to preview • Clusters expand on zoom" hint.
Selection anywhere triggers a floating preview card (framer-motion animated) with quick actions. Full modal is a centered, spring-animated sheet with rich details, community rating bar, and massive primary actions.
Toasts (sonner) provide instant, delightful feedback — e.g., "Sent The Birthday Problem! Logged as a V4 send. Great work."
Design principles visible: 10-year-old friendly (large tap targets, 16px+ body text, never tiny UI), AllTrails-inspired joy, premium shadows and micro-interactions, dark mode support.
A completely different, warm cream-and-forest aesthetic. Persistent top banner: "CragTrails Trust & Safety • Admin Console" with Shield icon and the line "Kids climb here. Every photo and route is reviewed. NON-NEGOTIABLE FOR SCALE".
Demo login (admin@cragtrails.app / demo) leads into a locked-down moderation environment. The layout includes a sticky header with "MODERATION + DATA TRUST" badge and a persistent footer explaining: "Without strong admin tools, bad data and photos will drive away serious climbers and parents. Trust & safety is our #1 product feature."
This is not theater — it is the philosophical core of the product.
Rich route cards with hero photos, community photo carousels (horizontal scroll, snap), condition reports with emojis, tick logbooks, "Send Pyramid" progress viz, bottom tab nav, massive "SEND IT" buttons, and photo upload flows — all styled and ready in globals.css. The richer data model in lib/types.ts (Areas, Routes with full betaNotes, photoUrls, sources attribution, Ticks, ConditionReports, Users) is designed for seamless merge from OpenBeta + in-app contributions.
Climbers don't need another noisy social network or unmoderated wiki. They need:
- Spatial clarity on the drive — "Is there anything good 20 minutes off my route?"
- Trust — Photos and beta that won't waste your day or put a 10-year-old in danger.
- Simplicity without stupidity — Big, obvious controls. No 17-step flows. Designed so a kid can navigate the core experience.
- Open foundations + community soul — We don't silo data. We build beautiful experiences on top of the open climbing commons while giving back.
We are deliberately not trying to be everything to everyone. We are building the climbing equivalent of a great trail app: fast, reliable, delightful, and safe.
# Clone
git clone https://github.com/<your-org>/climbtrails.git
cd climbtrails
npm install
npm run dev- Visit
/for the explorer - Visit
/adminto see the Trust Console (demo credentials in the UI)
Requires Node 20+. Leaflet and framer-motion are already wired. No API keys needed.
CragTrails is built on two complementary contribution systems:
CragTrails is designed to ingest and beautifully present data from OpenBeta, the free, open-source, community-driven climbing database (CC0 / Wikipedia-style for climbing).
How to contribute data that will eventually power CragTrails:
- Go to openbeta.io and create a free account.
- Find or create an area/crag page.
- Use "Add Climbs", "Edit", or "Add photo" directly on route and area pages.
- Changes appear quickly in OpenBeta's "Latest Contributions".
OpenBeta contributions (routes, grades, descriptions, locations, FA info, photos) flow into CragTrails with proper attribution (sources: ["openbeta", ...]). See lib/types.ts and lib/seed-data.ts for the exact schema.
Resources:
- OpenBeta How to Contribute (sign up + edit buttons on every page)
- Community forum: community.openbeta.io
- Discord, GitHub org (OpenBeta), and detailed docs in their repos
- Bulk/advanced: their climbing-data and open-tacos repositories
Personal ascent logs ("ticks"), condition reports ("Dry & bomber", emoji + photo), community photos, and on-the-ground beta notes are contributed directly inside CragTrails.
These flows are intentionally moderated through the Trust & Safety console before they appear publicly. This is non-negotiable.
- Prototype "Log this ascent" already exists in the modal (try it!).
- Full photo upload, condition reports, and rich tick logging are styled and architected (
globals.csshas.community-scroll,.tick-card,.send-it-btn, etc.). - All user-generated visual content receives human review.
We credit sources rigorously and protect the experience for families and new climbers.
See CONTRIBUTING.md for the full Skeptical CEO process that governs all code and product changes.
This project is not a typical open source free-for-all.
Every proposed change — no matter how small — must survive the Skeptical CEO Review Process (detailed in CONTRIBUTING.md).
The lead maintainer begins every review by assuming "this adds bloat or the wrong priority." Only after the contributor provides rigorous Proof of Value (real climber problem + quote or AllTrails analogy, simplicity impact on 10-year-old navigation, growth/retention evidence, and "why not simpler?") plus sign-off from at least one other reviewer does it get merged.
Why this produces a better product long-term than normal OSS:
Normal open source tends toward tragedy of the commons: enthusiastic contributors add "nice-to-have" features, scope creeps, UIs become complex, performance and maintainability suffer, and the original delightful core experience dies under a thousand papercuts. New climbers and kids are the first to leave.
CragTrails inverts this. The skeptical filter is a feature. It forces ruthless prioritization around the actual jobs climbers hire the app to do. It protects the radical simplicity and trust that are our differentiators. It reduces burnout for maintainers. It creates a high-signal environment where contributors know their time will result in something that ships and delights users for years.
The result is not slower shipping — it is better shipping. Focused products with strong opinions and obsessive quality win.
This governance model is core to CragTrails' identity. We are proudly built by Skeptical Agents who would rather ship nothing than ship something mediocre.
- Next.js 16 (App Router) + React 19 + TypeScript
- Leaflet + react-leaflet for the map (no API keys, fully client-side after hydration)
- Framer Motion + Sonner for joyful, accessible micro-interactions and toasts
- Tailwind 4 + custom design system in
globals.css(delightful, 10yo-friendly, AllTrails x climbing holds palette) - Rich data model (
lib/types.ts) built for OpenBeta + Mountain Project + TheCrag + user merges with mandatory source attribution - Prototype seeds + admin auth foundation already in place
Important for contributors: This is not the Next.js from your training data. Read the guides in node_modules/next/dist/docs/ before making code changes.
Built with love for the climbing community.
Data foundations inspired by and designed to interoperate with OpenBeta.
Special thanks to the volunteers maintaining open climbing data everywhere.
Only items that have survived Proof of Value will be built. Current focus: polish the existing map hybrid, wire richer data from lib/seed-data.ts, and ship the first real moderated contribution flows (photos + conditions) behind the Trust Console.
See open issues and the Skeptical CEO process before proposing new work.
CragTrails — Climb. Discover. Protect. Trust is the product.
Built by Skeptical Agents who ask "why?" before every line of code.