Vagabond Life

When it comes to traveling a lot, certain issues always come up: where to stay and where to stay the first night, how to get from the airport to the hotel, where to do laundry, etc.  One of the most important issues is, how to get money.  You’d be surprised, but for me it’s a headache every time I visit a new country.   But that might just be me…  Here are the options you have:

Exchange money in your home country

That’s what my parents did… in the 80’s.  I don’t do that, because I neither have the time, the foresight, nor the willingness to enrich the stockholder’s of my bank by paying outrageous fees.  First off, I have to go to my banks headquarters, because my local branch won’t have Costa Rican Colones or Brazilian Reais.  That takes too much time.   Furthermore, I usually visit a bunch of countries on one trip and getting $500 in several different currencies is just silly and impractical.  There are more drawbacks that I point out in the next section…

Exchange money at the airport

You can go to the exchange places at the airport, but those places are expensive and often complicated, so I don’t like to do that.  That being said, going to an exchange place could be your best option just at arrival.  This will ensure you that you have some cash on hand to pay for every strange and unsuspected charge that comes up.  In any case, I wouldn’t exchange much money, just to last me for the first few days for two reasons: one, the exchange places charge big fees, and second, if you exchange too much money, you have to change it back paying the fees double.  Both reasons are also a drawback to exchanging money at my bank at home.  I hardly ever exchange money; I rather go to an ATM.

Use credit and debit cards at bank machines

Going to a bank machine in the country I am visiting is usually the most convenient option.  Nowadays, the worldwide banking networks reach sometimes even the remotest places in Latin America.  It’s just a question of finding the right ATM for your cards.  And that can be a challenge!  My advise, bring as many different cards with you as possible and don’t confine yourself to just credit cards – sometimes debit cards work as well.  While my credit cards were not accepted, I was able to get money in Playa Tamarindo with my German bank card from Deutsche Bank.