Topic: Has anyone here ever visited El Salvador and tried paying with bitcoin there? (Read 452 times)

I didn't expect this topic to have so many responses. And some of the responses already contain the answers I expected. Be it several links to someone's experiences and also several sources from someone's experiences uploaded to YouTube.

And it seems like some of the answers also opened up my thinking that if someone wants to experience using bitcoin as a legal tender. So maybe we can also not have to go all the way to El Salvador. because it may also be available in countries closer to ours. For example, I also found that paying for Taxi Grab in Singapore can also use bitcoin based on sources I read from Instagram.
(instagram)

Since I have found the answer I was hoping for so I will close this topic. Thank you everyone for sharing your views here. All your answers are very valuable. Some of them have even opened my thinking to be more open.  

Right now, I still have no plans to spend my earned bitcoin since I’m still in the process of accumulation stage, so I have no plans also to explore El Salvador as I’ll only be tempted to spend some of my hard-earned bitcoin. But maybe probably in the future, I will as I also include El Salvador in my bucket list so I can exactly tell how bitcoin adoption went there. And maybe by that time, the crime rate would also lessen as well, unlike now that it’s still somehow not totally safe at all.

The people of El Salvador do not spend or use BTC the way you think they do, yeah the BTC project was introduced by Nayib Bukele, and many people probably downloaded the Chivo wallet because of the $30 bonus, but the majority of the population do not understand what BTC is, neither do they use it. I am not going to travel to El Salvador to spend BTC, i can do that online or in some places in my country. Take note that BTC does not have to be a legal tender in a country before you can spend it there.

I've never been to El Salvador and I think going there would be a waste of money just because I want to know how to pay using Bitcoin there and I think it's better to buy or collect more Bitcoin, and even though El Salvador was the first country to legalize Bitcoin , it's not like I have to go there to find out the situation.
And regarding the issue of Bitcoin as a transaction tool, in my opinion it is the same, there is no difference and it is the same as in our country if there are traders or shops that use Bitcoin payments. And maybe the only difference is that it's legal and Bitcoin can be used freely for any transaction just like fiat, and I think we'll experience that too and it's just a matter of time.

Even though I've never been to El Salvador, that doesn't mean there aren't ways to learn more. You can check out some reliable resources that can give us a comprehensive understanding of the country's Bitcoin status. These can be articles from internationally recognized news agencies, surveys by financial institutions or even interviews with people conducted live over the internet.

I wouldn't go there even if someone wanted to pay for my entire trip. No one wants to risk their life when going to one of the countries with the highest violent crime rates in the world.

No mate, haven't been there but even I am curious to know how does things work there and I am curious to know how does they cope up wo transaction fees associated with it or they use it only for higher transactions. There are some stores which accepts Bitcoin as shared in this thread but using Bitcoin in a nation where it's legalised would be a different experience all together.

Anyone from El Salvador please share your experience

when first released in summer 2021 chivo used LN as the backnone.. where citizens had 'inbound balance from 'strike' .. and within 3 months it failed due to LN issues of strike
alot of citizens and merchants stopped using chivo and its inbound balance model.
basically citizens did not have their own self custody. they had $30 value of inbound balance from a LN institution.. were the LN institution had the actual custody in partnership with the governments coin hoard

chivo(el salv government) then moved to using Alphapoint as a custodian as a CEX backbone from january-ish of 2022 (second attempt).. instead of LN institution(that failed el salv)

the issue is that due to the debacle of the autumn 2021 bottlenecks and problems due to the stuff i said about the first attempt.. alot of el salv citizens and merchants still avoided using chivo and still blamed first attempt issue on bitcoin even though it was LN to blame.. now they just use alphapoint(as a cex) for remittance without the chivo part due to the bad taste left in their mouth due to the to 2021 experience(chivo-LN first attempt)

alphapoint (and its CEX accounts) are growing due to remittances.. but the chivo wallet part of domestic payments is still not as successful due to that first attempt failure due to LN

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i personally was going to go to el salv.. but from testimonials i got and even the "2 months living in el salv" video shows trying to get a merchant to accept bitcoin direct is a headache, trying to lock in bitcoin to then use chivo to then ask merchants of they accept chivo is a headache. and using a ATM is usually just to convert crypto to fiat.. but even that is requiring face recognition and ID and a 30minute processing to get a sms alert when its then ok to cash out crypto to fiat is a headache.. so still not a ecosystem of just using crypto to buy groceries, pay rent, bills.

ill wait a lil longer for them to work out the kinks, and try to get people to trust a second/third attempt at launching crypto nationally there for every day use

from what i can see alphapoint is becoming the CEX 'bank' and people just use alphapoint to hoard peoples crypto like people use coinbase as a bank for crypto in america. hopefully alphapoint develops better options than the 2021 first attempt. but only time will tell, and in 2024 i dont see testimonials that people can easily use their alphapoint custody funds to do easy headache free person-to person, person-to-business payments.. and its mainly currently just used for US/EU cex-to-elsalv cex for remittances which is the only growth factor measurably

My hands are up 🙌. That's if you're also curious to know who's interested to visit there and have that bitcoin transactions as legal means of payments and not specifically about our holding for investments here.
That'd will be some kind of new phase of life for me because I've always thought about the possibilities of this means of payments and how they can both interact on the P2P during the transaction.
I don't think if there's an existing country with a zero crime rate so just based on the news speculations, El Salvador has be quite a less crime rate country which that doesn't stand a threat for bitcoin holders.
I actually wishes to be there and have that experience of using and asset to pay my bills and how to freely Walk around with everyone suspiciously of having bitcoin without that strange attitude of finding someone holding some strange assets as bitcoin could still be strange to some sorts of societies despites its global spreading.

El Salvador is far from the country I belong to, and what I know is that it was the first country to recognize that Bitcoin was made legal tender in their country, if I'm not mistaken, and most of the communities here on this forum platform also know that too.

Although there are also other places here in our country that have other merchants that accept Bitcoin as one of the payment options in their businesses that they manage, And in El Salvador, it is normal for business establishments to accept Bitcoin as a mode of payment.

Nope, and unlikely I would visit just because to feel experience buying something directly using Bitcoin.

Perhaps when I had an important reason, to evade from tax example.

Pardon me, isn't Chivo a custodial wallet? they don't have to use lightning network because most people don't care about non custodial wallet, so I believe if they own Bitcoin, they will hold it in Chivo. AFAIK Chivo didn't charge any fees if someone send Bitcoin to other Chivo wallet, so why they need to use LN?

I've not traveled to El Salvador and I don't wish to visit anytime soon but if I wanted to travel to a bitcoin friendly nation, El Salvador would be the least of the countries on my list. The difference between El Salvador and other Bitcoin friendly countries is that Bitcoin is recognized as legal tender, aside that the adoption rate is still at infancy. From what I've been reading, a vast majority of the locals still prefer US dollars as a medium of exchange for their businesses.

Should there be a point in visiting a country that uses Bitcoin when I can do same in my country?
El Salvador serves as a great example for countries who consider adopting Bitcoin fully and am sure it would be as beautiful and a great destination of sort.
If and when I do visit there, I would have grown my BTC investments and have a steady expense portfolio dedicated to just the trip and cruise.

Lots of videos uploaded by vloggers about how they used or pay bitcoin on EL Salvador https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YP7EJT1cjAI

You can also see the experience of the merchants in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HIbRlhJfSw

We can see that there's positive and negative results happened but hopefully their government will help their citizens to get proper education about bitcoin since they really know to handle well their bitcoin since usually they got afraid for this because they always get afraid when bitcoin price drop they lose their money.

Nice question for bitcointalk member ever visited El Savador and fell how excited when using bitcoin for payment transaction, currently I don't go there but have planning one day later will try using bitcoin as payment transaction. Actually I don't popular with El Savador what are the best place there and how excited for tourism going there exceptional using bitcoin as legal currency transaction. I will make some research on google and looking what is the best and beautiful place there before visiting El Savador and enjoying not only using bitcoin as payment transaction but want to enjoy with beautiful place.

El Savador become more popular country after accepting bitcoin as legal payment transaction, I don't how excited many tourism coming there for enjoying the beautiful place or want to feel excited using bitcoin as payment currency only.

It's a different experience probably if you do it in a country that's legalized bitcoin, you won't be getting the same vibes in Thailand and Indonesia or the Philippines in regards to smoking marijuana (medicinal or recreational) because in Thailand, it's legal there and you're good to use it to some degree but if you do it in Indonesia or the Philippines, that's the same with this one, you don't really feel it if you're alone and the government supports what you're interested in so yeah, maps of stores near you isn't the same experience. I do have the same feels about bitcoin being used as a currency though, although I'm not scared about the risk of crime committed because I use bitcoin, I'm more on the privacy part because the moment that someone knows that I'm invested in bitcoin, I'm definitely going to be pestered by a lot of people because they want to talk nonsense stuff about it, no one wants to learn about bitcoin, they just want to know what you're doing with it, the crimes that ties with bitcoin and other redundant stuff.

Bitcoin in El Salvador is mostly popular with tourists who specifically travel there to try and experience real world adoption. Amongst the general population it has not really caught on. If you meet somebody from El Salvador, the subject of Bitcoin will not come up because there is not much interest there. For the merchants who embraced it and are knowledgable in how Bitcoin works, I am sure they are thriving, but overall, adoption is very slow.

Well, I do not know or have heard of any body or user of this forum who have traveled to El Salvador for whatever reason, but personally myself, I do have plans of traveling to that country someday in the future, it's not particularly about just experiencing the freedom to use bitcoin without attracting legal implications, but to learn more about their bitcoin payment systems, like other sophisticated bitcoin payment systems they must have developed and are currently using right now that is not available any where else in the world.

Being the first country to make bitcoin a legal tender, I trust that they must have come up with new kind of bitcoin payments systems that is not yet available to other nations where bitcoin is yet to become a legal means of transaction, so, if I am visiting El Salvador, this possibly will be my major reason for going there, including other personal reasons as well, which one of those is, to enjoy, and have a feel of the countries atmosphere and so on.

There is no even one from this post that have been in EL Salvador but we all have read so many articles and proofs that this country is the sanctuary of Bitcoin and there are still no other country that offers what El salvador does .

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So the thread seems to be gathering links from internet as no direct testimonial from actual person that have been there.

All of us who are connected with cryptocurrency wish that Bitcoin is legal in their country. Maybe Bitcoin is legal in many countries and Bitcoin is illegal in many countries. Countries where Bitcoin is legal can buy and pay for goods from that country with Bitcoin. However, those whose countries have not yet legalized Bitcoin have not been able to get that taste, that is, they could not purchase any product with Bitcoin and pay for it. For which they have a curiosity in mind that they will travel to El Salvador, the first country in the world to legalize Bitcoin, and buy something from there and give Bitcoin as payment.

Also I have a similar curiosity in my mind as Bitcoin is not legal in our country so if I ever have time or opportunity I will travel to El Salvador, a Latin American country. There is even monitoring of various Bitcoin related activities and purchase of any product that will be paid with Bitcoin (only desired). But I would like to thank the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, for making Bitcoin so popular, because of his tireless efforts, his country has become the first Bitcoin legalization country in the world. If there are such modern and articulate leaders like him in different countries of the world, maybe Bitcoin will be legal in those countries too.

I don’t know for sure, but I’ve read some news about people complaining about the bitcoin issue and majority of these complains where made by the petty traders as well as most of the country’s citizens but I think the decision by their president was a concrete one and I guess the president saw the future and I could only imagine how much the country must have made from the recent bill run as I could remember when they were mocked for buying high and then bitcoin kept dipping but now, I think the reverse is the case and they should be smiling to the bank if the need be.

I haven’t been to El Salvador myself, but I think the bitcoin was imposed on them and it will take much more time for its citizens to adapt fully to it but whatever the case might be, they will still adapt.

In short, no one here has ever been to El Salvador and we don't know exactly what's going on there. What we know are just a few pictures and videos circulating on social networks, other than that we have nothing more. I also asked this question and I also want to know the bitcoin adoption situation in El Salvador, but no one can answer this question.
For me, using bitcoin as a means of payment is not attractive enough for me to spend time there, while as I know, El Salvador has the highest crime rate in the world. I won't go there and don't intend to go there just for bitcoin.

Of course merchants will accept Bitcoin as a means of payment because every merchant must accept bitcoin as a form of payment for goods or services as stipulated in the law pushed by Nayib Bukele and later passed by his parliamentary majority. According to the current law in El Salvador, anything included in goods and services previously paid for in fiat currency can now be paid for in bitcoin. The Bitcoin community can spend Bitcoin more freely there, although the government does not require consumers to switch to Bitcoin, but those who make transactions using Bitcoin will receive a one-time incentive equivalent to $30.

Bitcoin City is a paradise for the Bitcoin community, they can do anything there with the Bitcoin they have. The residents and tourists who come there can use Bitcoin for everything, they can pay for anything with Bitcoin, clearly this experience is a sensation that those of us who have never been there have never felt before. Of course, having the opportunity to go there is like a dream come true, there are many things you can do with Bitcoin including exploring the very famous Bitcoin city.

havnt visited but have read, heard, seen many testimonials.. overall opinion is:

though it became legal tender in 2021. its initial attempt at adoption failed due to bad advice of a stupid LN fangirl business pretending his LN service was bitcoin, the government then used LN for the backbone of chivo, and within months the liquidity/bottlenecks and flaws of LN payments caused outrage and disappointment of people in el salv. they then called it a failure of bitcoin even though the issues were about the lightning network not bitcoin network

and while el salvador was having issue with lightning but falsely calling it bitcoin(shifting blame). we had the cultish LN group promoting bitcoin adoption in western media via their LN service as a success, exaggerating and lying about the reality just to promote their LN service involvement...
even when their involvement had nothing to do with the bitcoin network, nor was a success.. same LN fangirl business done the same innigeria and made them not like the experience too

the stories of bitcoin spread even though el salv's didnt see the glamour in the same shine as western media portrayed

el salvador has to yet do alot more work to popularise and win trust of bitcoin due to the failures of LN that gave bitcoin a bad reputation, even when el salv citizens never used bitcoin due to the bait and switch game of the LN scheme

the remittance in and out of el salv via bitcoin (via CEX) is growing(2023-24). but the experience of the chivo-LN(2021) left a bad taste in many citizens and businesses mouth. both citizens and businesses try to avoid using chivo due to that bad LN experience pretending to be bitcoin, which has lead to many still not trusting bitcoin as they are not sure the 'bitcoin' they might get actually being bitcoin and not just another liquidity scam that cant settle of some other network

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and that guys conclusion
find and ATM to get fiat or avoid bitcoin and use another network... one that already failed the el salv population
conclusion: people are not adopting BITCOIN for daily use, its just used within CEX as a border crossing value transfer
(a way to avoid western union headaches when doing remittances/ border control inspections of travel/vacation money exchanges)

wow this is amazing experience , 2 months living completely using bitcoin? damn How I wish this will be available in my place since I cannot travel in ES since I still have no big amount to spend for.
but what I wanna see is many countries that will allow their people to have this same experience even if there is no total adoption , just let their people understand what is bitcoin and let it circulate for peoples choice.

This really amaze us how some countries hated bitcoin that much, but here with El Salvador, the government praises a lot when it comes to bitcoin. Well, not to mention the head of the country itself is a bitcoin enthusiast, so expect that bitcoin will be encouraged a lot in all his citizens.

I am also interested to visit El Salvador but probably, when I’m no longer seeing bitcoin as a maximum investment, that when the time comes that I also want to spend bitcoin to satisfy my wants and needs and El Salvador is the key.

What is being seen very often now is that there are things to be able to establish a direct relationship with bitcoin and that a government does not bother, because it is the right country, I understand that the country has not fully adopted bitcoin, there are many that have not They believe in bitcoin and with the increase in the price of bitcoin, what Bukele is now proposing is insurmountable. Furthermore, El Salvador is one of the safest countries there is, because many security systems have been established, and they are also adapting to a system where they coincidentally define good policies to maintain within the country, with respect to children and their safety.

Furthermore, President Bukele is always open to good proposals and is very clear about what he has in mind. If I could find a job in El Salvador I would not hesitate for a minute to go there, a country that adopts Bitcoin is the best.

I have no plans on visiting it anytime soon but it's really interesting to see people and their experience with it. Reading about it with the government making available their own wallet is somewhat surreal that it's happening. If it makes everything easier when using it, why not? It could act like just a hot wallet, you know.

El Salvador is probably the best suitable country if you want to spend your bitcoin freely as many merchants will surely accept bitcoin payment, and yes a lot of bitcoin enthusiasts definitely aim to travel El Salvador having its known as a Bitcoin City.

I have not been to El Salvador but I always heard positive news about bitcoin there. Maybe if given a chance I would also want to experience traveling into El Salvador not just to test how bitcoin adaption went there, but I want also to explore the city of bitcoin as well even just for a week.

This is because once people understood how bitcoin or crypto works, they won't use their government's wallet. Instead they will use their own. I don't know how taxation of crypto works in their country. But if people will be exposed with their crypto dealings owed to using their government's portals, for sure they won't use it or have less likelihood to use it.

Exactly, but is there really a people who will go to El Salvador just to experience the so-called bitcoin as legal tender? Because I haven't seen videos or vlogs about this, yes, I'm aware that bitcoin is being accepted and adopted in this country, but the thing is, do many people there really use bitcoin? Or utilizing the privilege of bitcoin being a legal tender? I hope some people out there who regularly use or are using bitcoin for transactions will write their comments and experiences here.
Many users or people here are hyped about bitcoin being legal in this specific country and want to try the experience. Nothing wrong with that, but the thing is, is it worth it? I mean, you will spend money in order to fly to that country just to try using bitcoin for transactions? Maybe for others, but for me as a person in a country that doesn't treat bitcoin as illegal, I see it as an unnecessary movement.

I remember a discussion we had here in our local before where the question was, would you spend a million dollars for citizenship?

This program aims to attract wealthy crypto and property investors who want to enjoy the benefits of being a citizen of El Salvador, such as visa-free or visa-on-arrival access to 150 countries including the EU, the U.K., all Latin America, and most of Eastern Europe.

It's not just a simple financial investment; it's a huge decision that will open new opportunities for you. But it's also very risky; we know that given the volatility of crypto, we can't predict what changes may occur in the future.
If I were one of those wealthy individuals, I still wouldn't choose to join that program. Instead, I would expand my current business to provide jobs for some of our citizens.

But if you have a lot of money or hold Bitcoin and you can afford to travel there, why not, right? Maybe it's okay to just visit and stay for a week just to experience using Bitcoin as a legal tender in that country.

I remember seeing a few videos on youtube where people talked about their visit to El Salvador. The general theme was that most people don't use bitcoin and they don't use the wallet provided by the government, but some hold bitcoin and treat it like an investment, or a piggy bank.

It's not one or the other way round, so people who are enthusiastic about the use of bitcoin in the country are obviously wrong, but people who say there's no use and bitcoin has failed are also wrong. It's an unpopular form of payment, but a popular form of investment. Also, you can pay using lighting in a lot of places. I've read an article by a guy who tested it and he wasn't only on Bitcoin Beach, but paid for a cab and stuff.

You don’t really expect people who would travel all the way to El Salvador or move there just to be able to use their bitcoins as legal tender. It’s a nice thing to say on paper but when you consider the cost of such a move, you realize that it is not so easy. If anyone should consider moving to El Salvador because of their bitcoin friendly government, it should be miners. Bitcoin is not a legal tender in my country, but you can still find businesses that accept bitcoin as payment methods.

In essence, the news we read is El Salvador, one of the countries that has adopted Bitcoin the most, almost the people there use the Chivo Wallet to make it easier for them to carry out transactions, this is based on the policy of the president of El Salvador.

As I once read: El Salvador Adopted Bitcoin as an Official Currency; Salvadorans Mostly Shrugged.

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Talking about the experience of using Bitcoin in El Salvador, honestly I haven't gone and tried it, what's it like doing Bitcoin transactions there.

However, don't worry there is someone experienced in the adventure of using Bitcoin there.
for example, he tells something interesting.

The information I got.

This is to complete the information that needs to be seen: What it’s actually like to use Bitcoin in El Salvador.

It would definitely be an amazing experience if we could feel the sensation of being in a country that fully supports bitcoin, unfortunately we don't have a special board for Salvadorian on this forum so we can't expect direct experiences from native person there.

Unfortunately, what we think from outside is very different in its implications, in Lina Seiche's blog post on Bitcoin Magazin ^[1], she says:

"Fast-forward to today, I can’t use bitcoin as much as I would like. I would’ve loved to pay for my hotel stay in bitcoin, but the hotel couldn’t find its POS device. I’d love to pay my rent in bitcoin, but my landlord thought otherwise. I’d love to pay the customs office—well, I’m not sure I would love to pay them, but if I have to, I would like to do it in bitcoin. That didn’t happen either."

By the way, this discussion has already been discussed in another thread with "Buying/Selling & Using Bitcoin in El Salvador." title ^[2].

[1] https://bitcoinmagazine.com/el-salvador-bitcoin-news/i-moved-to-el-salvador-ask-me-anything
[2] https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/--5488260

Until now, visiting El Salvador as the only country that makes Bitcoin a legal medium of exchange is still just a dream for me. The very long distance from where I live and the financial limitations I have make it difficult for me to set foot in the country, but I have felt the sensation of paying using Bitcoin at the place I shop that accepts Bitcoin as a means of payment.

I just hope that even though it is very difficult to realize it in my country, like what is currently happening in El Salvador, one day it will be easier for Bitcoin users with the availability of the facility to pay using Bitcoin in my country. This forum is very broad, maybe there are some people here who have visited El Salvador and can share their experiences here.

I have never visited the country and never know how it is there, but from several sources I have read that El Salvador has implemented payments using bitcoin even though in some places it still accepts purchases or payments using fiat currency. For the thrill of purchasing using bitcoin, I once spent several items in an online shop that accepts bitcoin and I'm not that interested in now buying items using bitcoin.

The increase in tourism cannot be separated from the country's policy of utilizing bitcoin so that tourists and investors feel protected when visiting there. El Salvador has shown validity regarding the mindset towards bitcoin and they have managed to reach a much better level of adoption. This country continues to show rapid progress and is perhaps one of the countries that many people are interested in visiting.

If you want to see how paying with Bitcoin in El Salvador works, you can find the experiences of people who have been there and posted it on YT. However, do not live in the belief that you will be able to pay with Bitcoin wherever you want just because it is "legal tender", things are not exactly what they seem.

Younger people who have an entrepreneurial spirit have accepted Bitcoin, while the older ones still prefer to do business with the US dollar, which has been the official currency in that country for more than 20 years anyway. Sometimes it seems to me that some people think that El Salvador is the only place (country) in the world where Bitcoin can be spent in a physical store, but in fact in many countries where Bitcoin is not "legal tender" there may be more people who accept Bitcoin than in El Salvador.

It is always a funny topic, we have hundreds of pages of people praising Salvador, a ton of badmouthing their own country and situation, cheering on how Salvador will attract crypto lovers who will flee the countries that are antagonistic to crypto, how great things are there to spend your crypto, how wonderful everything will be yet...
In all this forum full of tens of thousands of crypto lovers there isn't a single one who has ditched his self-labeled shitty country for Salvador!

Serves as another proof that just babbling all day about crypto is not enough, there is Twitter and the forum where you can clap or say whatever and then there is real life!


And this is the reason all those plans about building a community or stand-alone town only with crypto as a liaison is pure vaporware at this moment.

This question about any forum member from El Salvador has been asked several times and I doubt if we have any member who resides or has visited the nation. We would have had a first-hand account of the Bitcoin situation in the country. Maybe one day we might have a member from the location.

Personal experience will be different from videos because everyone will have a unique experience. El Salvador also has different regions which might also bring diverse exposure for different tourists. I will not also want to visit El Salvador because of its malfunctioning legal system which has led to the incarceration of many innocent people who didn't receive fair trials. Such a trip will also be expensive for me and I don't want to spend my Bitcoin for now because it's my investment.

I agree with you. I admire El Salvador and the great job their president has done with bitcoin and its technologies. However, I do not see difference between it and other countries where bitcoin is also accepted and people use it daily.

Personally, I do not think that the experience will be any different from watching the YouTube videos of those people who have gone and are sharing their beautiful and amazing experiences with us.

Why there is need to visit and try? You don’t believe that Bitcoins are actually legal there? Bitcoins have really impacted a lot in the live of the people at El Salvador. The government knows the value and capabilities of the coins, and hence without giving a second thought they made the coins legal. Soon I have heard that they are also interested in giving people the options to invest in the coins with exciting investment plans. So yes we need to praise El Salvador for their bold decisions.

Maybe one day El Salvador will become one of my travel destinations. But I doubt whether I will be able to not get bored with the flight which takes more than 1 day 1 night. I checked and it takes about 26 hours from here with two layovers. But I probably wouldn't want to do it if it was just to spend bitcoins. But if it's for the purpose of traveling around the world I'll think about it.
It would probably be very interesting if there were actually El Salvadorans who had joined this forum and told stories about the country in this forum after the adoption of bitcoin. Because so far I have only observed this country through news on the internet.

If you only want get experience to use Bitcoin as a currency, you don't have to fly to El Salvador, just find the stores in your country using this maps https://btcmap.org/map and verify it by make some research.

Currently I don't want to use Bitcoin as a currency yet because people still think someone who own Bitcoin is rich, so it's dangerous. Since I also really care with my privacy, I would think twice to do it.

I am sure that many bitcoin enthusiasts are interested and curious to see the possible future of our world starting from El Salvador.

I personally have not been to El salvador myself and in my country, there’s almost no sign of bitcoin anywhere. From what I heard however is that stalls and other businesses in El Salvador are already using bitcoin as a payment method but not yet 100% of the country is bitcoin-friendly. Still, it’s nice to know that there is a step towards adaptation of bitcoin somewhere in the world.

Bitcoin legal tender, Bitcoin Beach, Bitcoin City, Lightning Network adoption are what helped El Salvadord to attract more visitors. They came to the nation for vacation, curiosity and for business like expanding their company business to El Salvador like Paxful years ago.

Effects actually exist but for El Salvadorians, not all of them are happy with legal tender. Because they are not Bitcoin investors and hodlers so with legal tender, they are forced to accept & receive bitcoins while they don't want it.

If their bussiness is small, their budget for bussiness operation with volatile price of Bitcoin. It affects value of their income at time of receiving bitcoin and time of cashing it out.

No, I am not exposing myself to 16 hours worth of flight radiation just to spend Bitcoin in El Salvador.

I can spend Bitcoin in basically any country in the world as long as I have an internet connection. Hell, I could sell my entire wallet seed without an internet connect, in an emergency situation, if I had to do that.

Your question is interesting and I would love to see either how many Bitcointalkers went to El Salvador or even are from El Salvador but I can't agree with you about your attitude towards crime there. El Salvador is still a country with one of the highest crime rate and it's not only about crime, criminals there are brutal killers who torture people. I personally wouldn't risk it, doesn't worth for me.

By the way, I saw Cointelegraph's video about that a year ago and would love to share it: [/url">

I haven’t but here is an article detailing the experiences of a student who went to ES & tried to live on Bitcoin for 2 months. https://www.coindesk.com/consensus-magazine/2023/08/07/two-months-in-el-salvador-the-ground-game-for-bitcoin-adoption/amp/

Now this is a thing that I want to check out, it's definitely something that would pique our curiosity especially mine because I'm a bit scared of doing flights, really want to know how is it there? It seems that no one has been to El Salvador in this forum, that would be a really awesome thing if someone would share their travel experience. I haven't even seen yet any people that are from that country too, no one shared their experience yet as an El Salvadorian so it's still a mystery to me and it's weird that we haven't seen any kind of interaction from them in the forum too, by now there should be some people in that country that would stumble across this forum by chance since bitcoin is a big deal there already right?

I'm quite curious, of the many users on this forum, has anyone ever visited El Salvador and felt the sensation of paying with bitcoin there?
This may be a trivial question but I'm sure many of you are also curious about this.

Or maybe someone intends to go there someday. Just to take a vacation and enjoy the country's friendliness towards bitcoin. And don't worry about crime in El Salvador. because it seems that their president, Nayib Bukele, has made the country much safer from crime during the period he was president. And fortunately he was re-elected as president there. Even though it is not completely free from crime, the crime rate there seems to be decreasing based on news reports spread on the internet.

And yes, I also heard that tourism in the country has increased interest or visitors after adopting bitcoin as a legal means of payment. So I hope there is someone here who has visited there. or at least have the desire to go there. And want to share the story here.