I visited 5shops / merchants in a row that don’t accept btc or used to accept btc in San Salvador.
🏃♂️ The nike store used to accept. Stopped 6 months ago they said.
🥩 Lunch steak place had never used it. Called Casa Fuego.
☕️ Coffee vendor in the plaza apparently never accepted it. Looked at me like I had 3 heads when I asked.
📱 Then the superselectos supermarket accepts bitcoin for groceries but not for phone credit so
we had to go to the street dude.
📞 phone credit vendor person never accepted btc.
Fortunately I was with @Napoleon Osorio ‘a team so they helped me out p2p 🤙 (highly recommend his guys!!)
So there are of course mega bitcoin-y areas across the country..
But Btc Payments adoption is quite hard to follow in #ElSalvador
I didn’t understand back then, nor that you could use Bitcoin as money.
At that point, I’d wiped my feet on the Bitcoin rabbit hole's doormat but hadn’t ventured further inside.
Anyway. I flew into Aqaba, rented a car, and headed north.
On the way to one of the Wonders of the World—Petra—I got caught in a uniquely dangerous snowstorm.
It was a surreal experience that taught me something unexpected: it can snow in the desert. ❄️🏜️
For some of these kids, it was their first time seeing snow.
I arrived at Petra armed with a series of podcasts about Wadi Rum's history.
I walked over 30,000 steps across what remains one of my favorite places in the world.
Listening to historians unravel the stories behind this ancient wonder made it all the more magical.
I didn’t need a guide, and I certainly didn’t need a donkey to get around, thanks to the podcasts. 🎧🐪
Petra is breathtaking—truly a must-visit.
From there, I drove north to the Dead Sea, from which you can see all the way to Israel.
I thought I'd go for a run along the absolutely mad coastline that's chock-full of salty rocks before going for a swim.
Fun fact: You can't actually swim in the Dead Sea.
I was the idiot who brought swimming goggles, thinking you could. Classic Brit.
Of course you can't swim—you're far too buoyant! 🤿🌊
I mooched about; I ate far too much surprisingly delicious Jordanian food, even finding Jordanian beer, before making my way back south, the trip complete.
Solo travel always leaves me thinking:
"This is amazing—but wouldn’t it be even better to share it with someone?"
And yet, here’s the kicker: the Bitcoin I sold to fund the trip would now be worth 12 times what it was.
I could be sitting on a cool £9,000 today. 9 THOUSAND POUNDS MY GOD.
Instead, I’ve got these damn, rather lovely memories.
Even better, I set this silly selfie—shown here—as the first picture on my dating profile a few days later.
No it was Bumble, not Tinder, since you asked.
And for whatever reason, a rather wonderful soul swiped right on it (yeah, she's probably more silly than me).
And we’ve been together for the past 5 years.
I couldn't be happier. ❤️
So yeah, HODLing Bitcoin is guaranteed to build you a better future.
…but sometimes, so can selling. 🧡
#NostrStory #Bitcoin #NostrTales
