The mission was clear: Test how well the AI could plan a trip to Norway, a place I had never been. So I didn’t do any of my usual obsessive internet research and instead asked three AI designers to create a four-day trail. None of them, unfortunately, mentioned saunas or salmon.
Two assistants, however, were eager to learn more about me in order to adjust their initially general recommendations, which they had thrown out in seconds. Vacay, a personalized travel planning tool, presented me with a list of questions, while Mindtrip, a new AI travel assistant, invited me to take a quiz. (ChatGPT, the third assistant, did not ask anything.)
Vacay and Mindtrip’s questions were similar: Are you traveling alone? What is your budget? Do you prefer hotels or Airbnbs? Would you rather explore the great outdoors or pursue a cultural experience?
Eventually, my chat sessions yielded what seemed like complete itineraries, starting with a day in Oslo and moving on to the fjord region. Eventually, I booked a trip that would combine the helpers’ information and go beyond a predictable list of locations.
This time, my virtual planners were much more sophisticated than the simple ChatGPT interface I used last year on a trip to Milan. Although it offered more detailed suggestions for Norway, I ended up abandoning ChatGPT at the travel planning stage after it crashed repeatedly.
Vacay’s premium service, which starts at $9.99 per month, included detailed recommendations and booking links, while Mindtrip, which is currently free, provided photos, Google reviews and maps. During the trip itself, everyone delivered instant information via text and always asked if more specific details were needed. Unfortunately, only ChatGPT offered a phone app, whose information I found to be outdated (the $20 per month premium version is more recent).
I’m not alone when it comes to turning to AI for help: About 70 percent of Americans either use or plan to use AI for travel planning, according to a recent survey conducted by Harris Poll on behalf of the personal finance app Moneylion , while 71 percent said using AI would likely be easier than planning trips on their own.
I decided to find out for myself in Norway.
A whirlwind day in Oslo
After I landed at Oslo Airport, all three assistants directed me to the Flytoget Airport Express train, which took me to the city in 20 minutes. I was happy to find my hotel next to the main train station.
The choice of accommodation was not easy. I was looking for a mid-range boutique hotel and the AI assistants generated several options with little overlap. I went with Hotel Amerikalinjen, Vacay’s recommendation, which it described as “a vibrant and unique boutique hotel in the heart of Oslo.” Its location was the main draw, but overall the hotel exceeded my expectations, combining comfort and style with the 20th century charm of its building, which once housed the headquarters of the Norwegian America Line shipping company.
For the one-day trip to Oslo, the assistants agreed, packing in the city’s top attractions, including the Vigeland Sculpture Park, the Royal Palace, the Nobel Peace Center, Akershus Fortress and the Munch Museum. I shared my location and asked each assistant to restructure the itineraries to start from my hotel. But when I gave in to my own research instincts and pulled out Google Maps, I saw that the order they suggested didn’t make sense, so I plotted my own path.
By the time I arrived at Frogner Park at noon, I had already covered half the sights and after walking past over 200 sculptures by Norwegian sculptor Gustav Vigeland, I was happy to sit and admire his granite monolith of intertwined people.
For lunch, the assistants recommended high-end restaurants in the bustling waterfront neighborhood of Aker Brygge. But I wanted a quick bite in a more relaxed atmosphere, so I left the AI and walked to the end of the walk, where I stumbled upon Salmon, a cozy establishment where I started with melt-in-the-mouth salmon sashimi and finished with a perfectly baked fillet. How come my assistants didn’t mention this place?
Next on my list was the Nobel Peace Prize, the Opera House and the Munch Museum. The assistants had not recommended pre-booking tickets, but luckily I had done so, learning along the way that the Peace Center was closed, a crucial piece of information that the AI failed to convey.
It was cold for mid-June, and as I walked along the harbor promenade to the Munch Museum, I spotted small floating saunas, which my assistants hadn’t included. I went back to the ChatGPT phone app for recommendations. Although I was keen to try a floating sauna, where people warmed up and then plunged straight into the icy waters of the Oslofjord, I took ChatGPT’s suggestion and booked the Salt Sauna, where I headed after spending a few hours Munch. Museum, with the extensive works of the Norwegian artist and the amazing view of the harbor of Oslo.
At the Salt Cultural Complex, a large pyramidal structure on the water, I was relieved that swimwear was a requirement. In Scandinavia, saunas are usually done naked, and earlier, I had asked ChatGPT about the etiquette at Salt, but he didn’t give me a definitive answer. After sweating it out with about 30 strangers in Salt’s main sauna, I dipped into a tub of cold water and then tried the smaller sauna options, which were warmer and quieter. It was the perfect end to a long day.
Waterfalls, green valleys, raging waters
Each of my assistants had different ideas about how to get to the fjord area. ChatGPT suggested taking a seven-hour train ride and then immediately embarking on a two-hour fjord cruise, which sounded exhausting. Mindtrip suggested taking a short flight to Bergen, known as the ‘gateway to the fjords’, and taking a cruise the next day, which might be more efficient, but would also mean missing out on one of the most scenic train journeys in the world . Vacay also recommended a train ride.
After speaking with the assistants, I decided on a shorter train journey (six hours) that would take me to Naeroyfjord, a UNESCO World Heritage site with lush green valleys and thundering waterfalls. But to figure out the logistics of transportation and accommodation, I needed live train schedules, which I found on my own, and hotel availability information that none of the assistants had.
At this point, I was desperate for human guidance to navigate the expensive and limited accommodations in the area. This is where the photos and reviews on Mindtrip came in handy, helping me understand that I would be paying fair prices for the spectacular setting of a mediocre hotel.
The train ride from Oslo to Myrdal is breathtaking: rolling hills, mountain villages, fjords, waterfalls. But nothing prepared me for the enchanting one-hour Flam railway ride that followed. Vacay had described it as an “engineering marvel” with a stunningly steep descent as it passes picturesque villages, dramatic mountains, rushing rivers and pounding waterfalls, with a dance performance featuring a mythological spirit known as the huldra.
The next morning I boarded a Naeroyfjord cruise, recommended by Vacay, on a 400 person electric ship. I was surprised by the calmness of the fjord. I later learned from a tour guide that I was lucky enough to visit when there were no big cruise ships. It was hard to imagine an ocean liner maneuvering through the narrow, windy fjord, but when I asked ChatGPT, he told me that 150 to 220 cruise ships squeeze through the fjord every year, a detail I felt trip assistants should have warned about. the travelers.
The cruise ended in the village of Gudvangen, where rain caused me to cancel a hike to a waterfall and instead try my hand at ax throwing at Viking Village Njardarheim. The assistants had told me there were buses leaving the city every four hours, a time frame that had worked with my original hiking plan, but now I was stuck. Fortunately, I noted the AI disclaimers to check all the information and found an alternative bus.
On my way to Bergen, I decided to stop in the town of Voss, famous for extreme sports like skydiving and spectacular nature. All the hotels suggested by the AI were booked, but a Google search led me to the lakeside Elva Hotel, which had delicious farm-to-table food. I suspect it didn’t make the AI list because it was new.
I finished my trip in Bergen, which, despite being Norway’s second largest city, retains its small-town charm with its colorful wooden houses and cobbled streets. With only half a day to explore, I followed Mindtrip’s short itinerary, starting with a sumptuous fish and chip meal at the bustling seaside fish market and ending with a cable car ride up Mount Floyen for panoramic views of the city and fjords. The AI dinner proposal at Colonialen was perfect: warm atmosphere, live jazz and local dishes.
The bottom line
Neither AI program was perfect, but they complemented each other, allowing me to streamline my travel decisions.
Overall, Mindtrip — with its sleek, dynamic interface that allowed me to cross-reference details with maps, links, and reviews — was my favorite. While it made some good recommendations, Mindtrip needed more prompting than Vacay, which offered a wider variety of recommendations with more detail. Unfortunately, Vacay doesn’t save chat history, which I discovered halfway through my design after closing the site tab in my browser.
The biggest downside was the lack of phone apps for Mindtrip and Vacay, which led me to rely on ChatGPT’s basic AI assistant when I needed on-the-spot guidance. Mindtrip, I’ve since learned, plans to debut an app in September.
However, there were times when I desperately craved human touch. Before embarking on a trip, I always reach out to friends and colleagues for recommendations. This time, as part of the AI experiment, I avoided contacting a Norwegian friend until after my trip, only to find out that we were both in Oslo at the same time.
This is one element of travel that I doubt AI will ever master: serenity.
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