La frontera de Bitcoin/ The Bitcoin Frontier
After Action Review: First Annual After Adopting Bitcoin Visit to Bitcoin Lake
Well, it’s finally over! What started as a means to attract Bitcoiners to come and experience a different Bitcoin environment, ended as a resounding success — based on questions we asked at the conclusion of the trip.
Admittedly, we started with a little timidity in trying to ask Bitcoiners to come AFTER the Adopting Bitcoin summit in San Salvador November 15–17 2022. Thankfully the organizers (Galoy Money) allowed us to “promote” this side event on the Adopting Bitcoin members telegram channel. We also promoted on Twitter. At the beginning, we weren’t really sure what to expect. Responses seemed a little muted to begin in mid-late summer. But as the date approached for the conference in El Salvador, more and more Bitcoiners where showing interest. We were very careful to make sure that only Bitcoiners who had already made the pilgrimage to Bitcoin Beach should come. We did not want to steal the thunder of the main event.
The travel from San Salvador to Guatemala didn’t start well! The night before, we learned that certain border crossings were closed due to a trucker strike! What would have normally been a 10 minute border crossing turned into a 45 minute fiasco. The Lago Bitcoin team left in the “advance car” and the rest of the group left in two small microbuses. When they arrived at the border, there was such confusion that none of them received a Guatemala entry stamp which caused a little hassle for them when leaving via air. It was more of a nuisance than an issue.
Leading up to the trip, we felt confident that Bitcoiners would enjoy the experience because we designed our orange pilling towards businesses that Bitcoiners would want to spend sats at. The goal was to create an environment in which a Bitcoiner could come and essentially live on Bitcoin. A Bitcoiner can come to Panajachel and use bitcoin for transportation within the city, transportation (boat) across the lake, eat at a myriad of restaurants, stay in hotels and Air B&Bs, enjoy nightlife, tour around the lake, purchase local artisan gifts, purchase coffee, and even get a hair cut using bitcoin.
We designed the trip for the Bitcoiners to experience our threefold mission of: education, creating a Bitcoin circular economy, and Bitcoin mining. We also included tours of the solid waste facility in Panajachel which will become the cornerstone of our waste-to-energy-to-Bitcoin project to help change the economic incentives for trash disposal and in the process, hopefully, begin the process of help clean the lake in a completely decentralized fashion. It is our goal that this “digital gold” remain in Guatemala through a decentralized basic income (DBI) project.
Thankfully, the trip meet or exceeded expectations and all would either come back or consider coming back!
Our onboarding experience includes well established business and new business by young entrepreneurs. Some recorded the highest one day sales in the history of their businesses when the Bitcoiners showed up!
We have a lot of work to do, but thankful for the pioneers who traveled to the frontier of Bitcoin adoption in Panajachel, Guatemala.
For more information: bitcoinlake.io or follow us on Twitter @lakeBitcoin
