Map guide
How to use Bivaq
Place types and their local names, the map legend, the filters and how to read a place page — everything you need to find a night on the map.
3 min readUpdated 27 October 2026Read in Slovak
Bivaq is a map of places to sleep in the mountains without a booking: shelters, bivouacs, lean-tos and caves across Europe. Everything on it is free, for everyone, signed in or not. This guide walks you through the place types, the marks on the map, the filters and the place page.
Place types
Every place has one type. The type tells you what kind of roof to expect — not what the place is called. The same type has a different name in every country: a Finnish laavu, a Swedish vindskydd and a Norwegian gapahuk are all three-walled lean-tos. Under each type you will find the words you will meet on signs and in the field.
Unguarded shelter
An enclosed cabin with no warden, usually free and with no booking.
Local names: cabane non gardée, orri, borie, buron (France) · autiotupa, kammi (Finland) · raststuga (Sweden) · útulňa (Slovakia) · útulna (Czechia) · Winterraum (Austria)
Bivouac box
A small box high in the mountains, often with bunks and blankets.
Local names: bivacco (Italy) · Biwak (Switzerland) · Biwakschachtel (Austria)
Lean-to
A roof and three walls: it keeps the rain off, not the cold.
Local names: laavu, kota (Finland) · abri (France) · vindskydd (Sweden) · Schutzhütte, Grillhütte (Germany) · gapahuk (Norway) · wiata (Poland)
Cave
A cave or a rock overhang you can sleep under.
Wild spot
A spot to bivouac under the open sky, with no roof.
Emergency shelter
Rescue infrastructure for an emergency — never a planned night.
Local names: päivätupa (Finland) · nødbu (Norway)
Guarded hut
A staffed hut, usually booked ahead. A smaller mark on the map.
Local names: rifugio (Italy) · koča (Slovenia) · schronisko (Poland) · fjällstuga, fjällstation (Sweden) · turisthytte (Norway) · bouda (Czechia) · gîte d'étape (France)
Map legend
Every place has a mark on the map with the symbol of its type. Shape and colour add its state: places with no booking are solid, staffed huts are smaller, emergency shelters are an outline only and closed places are struck through. Zoom out and nearby places merge into a circle with a count.
- Walk-in place
- Guarded hutDrawn smaller — not a walk-in night
- Emergency shelterNever a planned night
- Closed
- Number of places
- Water source
The same legend is on the map itself: tap Map style and layers and open What the marks mean.
Map style and layers
The same panel switches the basemap and the layers:
- Bivaq — the default dark map, where the marks stand out best.
- Hike — a light map with the coloured trail waymarks.
- Satellite — aerial imagery. Available once you sign in, which is free.
- Relief — terrain shading, so ridges and valleys show.
- Bivaq trails — long-distance trails with stages and nights.
- Marked paths and Hiking routes — the path network and named routes from OpenStreetMap.
- Water — springs and other water sources.
Filters
Open the filters with the Filters button on the map and on the list of places. The panel keeps telling you how many places are left.
Geography
- Country
- — Places inside the country's borders.
- Mountain range / area
- — A mountain range or area within the country.
- Elevation (m)
- — A range of elevation, in metres.
- Long-distance trail
- — Places along one of the Bivaq long-distance trails, within the distance you choose.
Type
The same marks as the place types above; caves and wild spots share one tile.
Survival features
Only places where someone confirmed it count — "not known" never counts as yes.
- Fully enclosed
- — Four walls and a door, not an open shelter.
- Heat source
- — A stove or a fireplace inside.
- Water nearby
- — A water source close to the place.
- Raised sleeping platform
- — Raised wooden boards to sleep on.
Access & logistics
- Free, no reservation needed
- — Free and no booking: a night with nothing to arrange.
- Price
- — Free, a voluntary contribution, or paid.
- Reservation
- — Whether the place has to be booked ahead.
- Access
- — Open to walk in, or a key is needed.
- Bike-friendly
- — Reachable and suitable with a bike.
- Winter room
- — A room left open in winter while the hut is closed.
Capacity & quality
- Capacity
- — How many people can sleep there.
- Verified this season
- — A dated status confirmed in the last 12 months.
- Has photos
- — Places with at least one photo.
- Has rating
- — Places visitors have rated.
A filter with no data in the area you are looking at is not shown in the panel.
How to read a place page
A status with a date. A place is open or closed only when someone saw it and we know when. Otherwise the status is unknown. We do not delete an old report: you see it with its date and decide whether it is enough.
Yes, no, not known. Stove, water, sleeping platform and winter room each have three answers. "Not known" means nobody has recorded it yet — it is not a quiet yes. If water says not known, carry water.
Where the data comes from. Most places come from OpenStreetMap, the Finnish ones also from the LIPAS register, and the rest from people who slept there. The sources are at the end of each place page. None of it is a promise — the mountain does not read our database.
How to help
Everything on the map comes from someone who was there. Once signed in (it is free), from a place where you slept you can add:
- A report — what state it was in, when you were there and what the next person should know.
- An answer to a short question — one fact, such as whether there is water nearby. "Don't know" writes nothing.
- A photo — optionally with what it shows and when it was taken. We never read the location from a photo.
- A night in your log — your private record of nights. Nobody else sees it.
- A new place — if the map is missing one. Add a place
Planning
- Saved places and lists. Save a place and sort it into lists. A list can be shared by a link that shows the places, never you.
- Long-distance trails. On the trails page every trail has stages, nights and an elevation profile — in either direction.
- Trip planner. Plan your nights along a trail and download them as GPX. Plan a trip