Cards are great. So long as they are accepted. The major finance companies will tell you they are accepted in a trillion places worldwide but you can bet your bottom dollar they weren't thinking of you in the backwaters of Remotistan when they came up with that catchy number.

They're not especially consistent either. Entering Syria we discovered that only one in six cards worked. Suddenly we're not looking quite so clever.

I guess the advice is to take a variety of cards (Mastercard and VISA) from multiple institutions and not rely on them.

One useful point in having multiple cards is that you only need carry one variety literally on your person. If it's not accepted you can always nip back to the bike to retrieve the other. That should give you a fighting chance should you get mugged. You'll still have cards left.

Some people also take expired cards with them and offer those up when the masked man approaches. I don't know. Maybe it works.