Hi Reader,
How are you?
I am in Malta enjoying a couple of days off to explore the island on scooter with my SO. I am happy to have chosen the small island to spend some time in, it has been a lovely surprise :)
Update on the survey
The survey will be open for just one more week.
We still need a lot more participation from women from across the world and are in desperate need for voices from Asia, Africa, Central and South America and even Europe.
Here is the representation map so far. We got a few more participants from the Netherlands, the UK, and New Zealand - THANK YOU!!
GREY = Fewer than 5 participants
And you could still win $250 USD in cash. Funnily enough, last week's winner, Maura, is booked to come to us to Antarctica so I will get to meet her in person next December.
Please pick the survey that best represents you and click on the button below:
Last chance for Japan and Croatia & Montenegro
We are closing bookings for Japan in March and have just one spot left, in either shared or single accommodation.
This tour will be accompanied by me and a photographer who will capture all the beautiful candid moments, and I can't wait to meet you!
We have scheduled the trip for Sakura (cherry blossom) and hope to see the pretty, fairytale petals floating in the air.
I am excited to return and more importantly, to introduce you to the many female artisans, artists, chefs and leaders that will open the doors to their kitchens, restaurants and studios and share a slice of Japan with us.
This is a tour that takes you behind the closed doors of a fascinating culture without the mishaps or the cultural faux-pas that would be common without the advise and translation of a local Host.
If end of March / beginning of April doesn't work for you, we also have the same tour in June for a quieter and more affordable time of the year and in October for the fall colors.
2026 is your last chance to join us in Croatia & Montenegro as we will not be running this tour in 2027 so if you are keen, reserve your spot now before the trips fills out.
From 2027 / 2028 we will return to Croatia with a sailing version of the trip that explores the islands but the current program with Dubrovnik and surroundings followed by Montenegro will not be offered again.
Be careful when using AI to plan your trip
I have been in Malta for a bit over 2 weeks and while I am mostly working, I have been exploring the island and nearby Gozo and booking some activities and tours while scouting the destination for our upcoming tour (PS Join the waitlist if you want to be the first to know when the trip goes live).
Like most of you, I use AI in my day to day, be it through the AI snippets Google gives at the top of the search results or be it via ChatGPT that we have a subscription to as a business.
This is the first time that I use the tool this extensively to help me plan the trip, and I have experienced so much incorrect information and plain untruthfulness that it has been shocking.
Everything it has told me, I have had to spend time double checking. While it has been useful at times, I must say that the former way of planning a trip still is a much more efficient and just overall better way to plan in my opinion.
What I use without AI:
- Google searches that result in articles written by experts and not the AI blurbs at the top that have often told me incorrect things, like wrong opening / closing times or suggested places / restaurants that no longer exist or businesses being owned by women because another AI-generated generic article that made it to the top of SEO said that a restaurant was women owned when it is not.
- Google Maps to see distances and plan days according to time to get there and distance, as well as the latest opening times. We rented a scooter for a couple of days to get around the island and AI has given us unrealistic plans with distances being longer than it accounted for or opening times not taking into account winter or the latest schedule of a place. It also suggested sunset activities that would take place at night time now because of the shorter winter days.
- Recommendations from experts. Be it local guides who I hire for a private tour or join for a set tour, articles written by local bloggers (not bloggers who spend a coupe of days visiting but those who live here), travel magazines that share my style of travel like Conde Nast, travel guide websites, official tourism websites like Heritage Malta or the tourism office, the Michelin guide or The Fork for restaurants, Mr & Mrs Smith or The Telegraph for hotels,...And asking people, like Hotel Concierges, bartenders at cool bars, or Maitre D' at posh restaurants, etc.
- Go to the source, like the official website of the museum or attraction, or the social media account or Google maps place of a restaurant rather than any third party site or source.
And I am not the only one.
There have been many notorious cases of AI messing up travel in some big ways, or AI being the source of a lot of issues.
Here are a few things to take into account when planning your next trip, whether you use AI or not:
- AI created photos of the Dutch tulip fields showing scenes that don't exist in real life. Tourists flocked to these locations expecting the tulip fields against the picturesque wind mills when this is not actually the case. The photo was engineered with AI. Read here.
- As it happened to me, many itineraries proposed by ChatGPT and alike are often unrealistic or include fake attractions or places that are permanently closed. Studies show that 90% of travel itineraries are incorrect, so you really need to double check everything they suggest. They also are inefficient or don't make logical sense, so you really shouldn't take anything they say for granted. See study results here.
- Social media videos of places that do not exist at all, that have been created with AI and made completely up. Like this one about an attraction in Malaysia that was shared on tiktok.
The worst part of this is that AI "Hallucinates" (technical term used to refer to when AI invents things to fill in the gaps), and it does so with confidence, like a very good liar who believes its own lies, so even when you ask it to confirm, it insists in being right.
It's like a narcissistic friend who will take you down the wrong path and insist there used to be a bar there where he had a drink last year.
To me, AI is a source of ideas and inspiration that I contrast with other more reliable and expert alternatives. A sort of ballpark estimate, rather than a fact set in stone.
Stay safe and be careful out there, and always take everything AI tells you with a healthy dose of skepticism and a lot of patience validating it against original / official sources.
Have a great rest of the week!
Solo Female Travelers Co-Founders
