In the latest edition of our ‘Travel Writers Test AI Travel Advice‘ series, a Oaxaca local (and professional writer of travel itineraries) tests ChatGPT’s ability to plan a day trip in the hopes of discovering a new side to a city she knows well, but poor recommendations leave a strange taste in her mouth–and it’s not just the mezcal.
Early morning is the true golden hour of Mexico. Neighbors are out sweeping sidewalks, tamal vendors haul steaming vats around the neighborhood, and grandmothers shuffle home from markets in their aprons. All five senses are gently stirred awake beneath a bright sun that doesn’t yet burn. Strangers greet me with a cheerful “Buenos días” as I march obediently towards Café Cabañé.
I followed ChatGPT’s itinerary during Semana Santa, the week between Palm Sunday and Easter, when schools are on break, and the pace of an already laid-back city slows to a crawl. Oaxaca is exiting its high season and traffic thins. El Llano Park fills with kids learning to roller skate, zooming shakily over the cobblestone. The city exhales.
My curiosity about how AI would direct a visitor is as much personal as it is professional. I have spent the past 15 years designing itineraries for group travel and guiding programs across the globe. After three years in Mexico, my work is increasingly centered around the place I call home, and colleagues wonder about job security in the age of AI.
Wondering if I am encouraging my obsolescence, I prompted:
“Hi ChatGPT, I am a woman traveling alone in Oaxaca City. Can you please build me a one-day itinerary in the city, appropriate for someone who has lived here for years and prefers recommendations outside of the tourist-saturated? I am interested in art, indigenous cultures, gastronomy, coffee, and mezcal. I will be using this itinerary on Wednesday, April 1st. Thanks!”
In hindsight, perhaps the “Thanks!” was premature.
In a touristy city like Oaxaca, it’s easy to sit in coffee shops surrounded by foreigners, hearing just splashes of Spanish poured into a pool of overwhelming English. My first stop on the itinerary is a great suggestion, and one I am confident travelers would not visit even if recommended. Santa Lucía del Camino is a town hugging Oaxaca City’s eastern extremities, where a 30-minute walk from the city center rewards you with true immersion into the local pace of life. Tourists disappear and are replaced with banda music blasting from auto repair shops, and grandfathers play chess beside a sidewalk locksmith. It isn’t a town I would expect ChatGPT to direct me to, much less for a cup of coffee. It is also, coincidentally, where I live.
Much like Santa Lucía itself, Café Cabañé has no Instagrammable aesthetic that would make it appeal to the average traveler. It is instead a perfect representation of Mexico: humble, locally-sourced, prepared with pride, and for the community. There is an animated conversation at the bar as I enter, and everyone turns to say hello. My americano is well-balanced, but decidedly not as filling as food. ChatGPT did not instruct me to eat breakfast, a surprising oversight given that its suggested itinerary ran from 8 am to 11 pm. I sip my coffee and stare longingly at the neighborhood market next door.
Stomach empty, I head off towards the winding streets of Jalatlaco, a charming neighborhood I always wander around when friends visit. My specific instructions are to explore “home altars,” which would only be seen during Día de los Muertos and would require me to, well, enter people’s homes. It reads as an approximation of cultural familiarity, like recommending a visitor to Canada to observe Christmas stockings in mid-June.
Unsurprised to not find any altars in this season, I instead stumble upon a group of men pouring colored sand into molds, forming the intricate Holy Week “rugs” that processions will march over. They are ephemeral works of art, and some Googling confirmed that Jalatlaco’s preparation of these tapetes was widely publicized online. ChatGPT had my dates of travel. Why wouldn’t it have mentioned it? An admiring crowd of onlookers clusters around the mandalas, which the wind could whisk away at any moment. It is one of those moments of collective awe that stay with you after your travels and for which AI cannot plan.
It is tempting to camp out at a neighboring coffee shop and watch their progress, but my itinerary bids me south. My next stop is Casa de la Cultura Oaxaqueña, described as a “deeply local cultural hub with rotating exhibitions, workshops, and rehearsals.” I admittedly haven’t been here before, as I understand it to be closed to the public. AI assures me, however, that this is “exactly why it’s worth your time.” My instructions are to check bulletin boards for announcements of classes and rehearsals that I can observe. Beneath a towering sculpture of Quetzalcoatl, a small art gallery offers free admission. I take a few minutes to enjoy the collection before looking for the main entrance into Casa de la Cultura and the cultural hub promised.
“This is it,” assures the security guard.
A quick Google confirms I am in the right spot. I notice that the top review is from seven years ago and indeed mentions quietly observing classes, exactly as ChatGPT recommended. Filtering through recent comments, locals mourn the closure of communal spaces in the remodel. Not a problem. Travel requires flexibility, and I have no agenda besides following the whims of my AI overlord.
“Casa de la Cultura Oaxaqueña is no longer open to the public. Can you give a new recommendation?”
ChatGPT responds with a chipper, “You’re right to flag that—and your instinct is good. Even though Casa de la Cultura Oaxaqueña technically still exists, access can be inconsistent or limited, and many cultural centers in Oaxaca are functionally under-programmed or not truly open to the public day-to-day.”
It is gaslighting on par with modern dating. Given the increasing reliance on ChatGPT to plan complex travel itineraries, it’s concerning how assuredly it suggested an itinerary that it seems equally confident would be unrealistic. I live in Oaxaca, speak Spanish, and have cell reception. What about the people AI is guiding on thru hikes or who have limited mobility? Ultimately, Chat pivots to a library 25 minutes away and in the opposite direction from my upcoming lunch stop. I groan, reapply sunscreen, and stomp off. 60 minutes of round-trip walking to admire the courtyard of a public library.
Fortunately, lunch is without incident. The recommended La Merced market is well known by locals and tourists alike and offers reliably average Oaxacan food. I scarf down a plate of mole amarillo, as instructed, glad to be off my feet.
Chat encouraged me to rest at my accommodations after eating, which was a welcome suggestion in a long day, but referred to this as “sobremesa time,” confusing a siesta for the conversation and company enjoyed at the table after a meal has finished. Like a toddler being sent upstairs for a nap, I march home.
Exhausted, I flop down on my bed and check my steps for the day: currently 15,174 and only halfway through my itinerary. I mentally prepare myself for the 3:30 pm “serious mezcal tasting.” While the activity is a solid recommendation, the spirit averages between 40-50% alcohol, and it’s hard to imagine imbibing too early before setting off to explore more things around the city. Mezcal has a tendency to redirect expectations of productivity.
Mezcaloteca, my recommended stop, is a cozy tasting room with an academic feel. Bottles of their personal label line dark wood shelves, and the lead bartender is animatedly explaining the 35 varieties of agave found in Oaxaca state. Unfamiliar with their brand, I request a floral, fruit-forward varietal and am served a tepextate without discussion. The world of mezcal is not unlike that of wine, where terroir, varietals, and production methods have a significant impact on the flavor. You order your drink by the agave, just as you would request a chardonnay or sauvignon blanc.
The bartender pours one ounce instead of the two typically served, a red flag for me when looking for a quality local bar, but appreciated given the hour. The price for this half portion is more than what I typically pay for its double, and the surrounding clients are exclusively international tourists. Not for the first time, I wonder why I was sent here specifically when I said that I live in Oaxaca. I savor my mezcal in small sips and return to the main tourist corridor.
I know my 5 pm mission to see “Independent design + weaving” will be hard to execute, as neither place ChatGPT is sending me works with textiles. Both are extremely well-known local projects that I am assured are “small shops” where I am told to “ask about dyes, fibers, and sourcing.” It’s hard to do so at Taller Jacobo & María Ángeles, given that theirs is the most famous alebrije workshop in the world, and they produce ornately painted wooden sculptures. Collectivo 1050, my next recommended stop, is a well-established ceramics project that collaborates with Oaxaca’s many clay-based communities and ships internationally. Both are great representative projects for someone new to Oaxaca, though neither is off the beaten path, and certainly neither focuses on textiles.
Dinner keeps with the theme of presenting wildly popular establishments as humble local projects. I’m sent to Levadura de Olla for a “ingredient-forward, not scene-driven” meal. A curious descriptor for a place with two Michelin stars. ChatGPT did not instruct me to make a reservation, as it did for my mezcal tasting, and it is with the embarrassment of telling a teacher you forgot your homework that I approach the hostess to see if they have an opening.
She winces. “I’m sorry, we are completely full tonight, but you can make a reservation online for a future visit.”
Unsurprised, I tell ChatGPT the restaurant has no availability and ask for another recommendation.
As with the morning’s failed visit, its response is one of unsurprise.“Totally—this happens a lot with Levadura De Olla (it’s small and Michelin-recognized, so it books out fast).”
The proposed substitute is for Los Danzantes, another Michelin-starred restaurant with nearly 5,000 Google reviews. If I can’t get into Levadura, it will be impossible to get into Danzantes. Frustrated and hungry, I make my way towards Labo Fermento, one of the alternate suggestions. The host cheerily mentions that they are full for the night, but he’s happy to seat me at the bar. Eager to rest, I agree and climb into my seat. My face still feels warm after the afternoon mezcal, and my itinerary has me scheduled for an after-dinner nightcap, so I stick with water and order the most local dish I can find: quelites y tamal, sauteed native herbs and mushrooms with a steamed corn dough. English surrounds me as I inhale my meal, pay three times what lunch costs, and leave hungry. One more stop to go—a final mezcal at a dive bar on the outskirts of the city center.
Bony’s Cantina is admittedly very local and certainly off the beaten path. I am unsurprised to find myself the only woman there and certainly the only foreigner. Smoke curls around me as I enter a time machine, taking me back much farther than the 2023 indoor smoking ban. Bony’s is half bar, half storage space, with decommissioned coolers and stacks of paint cans stacked in the corner. Norteño music screams from the speakers, and I have to shout to order my espadín.
The contrast between the warmly lit fine dining recs and this local dive is as sharp as my drink. A delivery driver chugs a beer at the table next to me before sliding his helmet back on and setting off into the night. Perhaps this final stop best summarizes my day traveling with ChatGPT. It is disjointed, utilitarian, and with no particular client in mind. For all of the last-minute pivots and misleading recommendations, it would have been more satisfying to let curiosity guide me; to follow the white rabbit, as I prefer to do when traveling. The magic is usually in the discovery.
No closer to knowing a new Oaxaca, I emerge from the smoke and set off for home.
