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Over time we can all build up our own world bank of foreign exchange.

My Dear Old Dad, in his dwindling years, would count out his own chest of pesetas, escudos, drachmas, francs, lira and deutschmarks.

There are, of course, glass cases in airports where we can now donate our left-over foreign money for charity.

But if you’re resourceful, and have a winning smile (Daddy’s Little Girl), you can walk off your plane with foreign money.

And in these straitened times we need all, and every kind of legit money, from wherever it comes.

The Queen’s coin

The most trusted coins in the UK are, of course, those with the Queen’s head on it.

And a roaring trade is done too on commemorative coins of the monarch.

With this Platinum Year of Queen Elizabeth II’s reign marked by the release of a limited number of coins to mark her 75 years.

They range on the Royal Mint from the UK 50p Brilliant Uncirculated Coin at £7 for the most pressed subject.

To the gold bullion Queen’s Jubilee Sovereign Set at £1,800, but be patient they’re awaiting stock.

Pawn Stars

Money shot: Miss America meets Mr Scotland in Vegas

Now if you think that that’s extravagant in these cash-strapped times then remember that gold appreciates in value.

Not that I’m advising you to scour your jewellery box and head for the pawn shop.

Although having seen the prices of old artefacts in the most famous pawn store in the world, the Pawn Stars shop in Vegas.

My fellow Britons famously and sneeringly accuse the Americans of having no history.

But here in the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop and across any number of fairs across the States specialising in music, war or whatever disproves that.

Coining it in

Bandanaman and the Bandanettes In Denver

And if you can’t afford a Confederate coin then you can always buy one of those say Buffalo Bill coins from the souvenir shop in Lookout Mountain in Colorado.

Coins have been with us since Roman days and before, the Lydians in modern-day Turkey credited with the first in 600BC.

And we always live in hope that all that digging that The Green-Fingered One does in our back garden will yield some treasure.

For now I’ll just hope that my commemorative C$2 Calgary Winter Olympics coin has appreciated in value.

Because I’m not holding out much hope for my Jordanian dinar note in our own world bank of foreign exchange.

Saddam hucksters

I did dodge a bullet (maybe even literally) when I body swerved the hucksters trying to sell Saddam Hussein Iraqi notes outside Petra.

Best stick to the coin-pressing machines and the money-making exercise that is The Royal Mint Collection.

It’s about time, is it not, that that wealth dripped down to us.?

It’s one of my go-to countries where I always feel right at home… America The Old Faithful.

It’s the land of the young and the hopeful, and those in their golden years.

Yes the best old geezers… and I’m not talking Joe Biden or Donald Trump either.

No, these are the old geezers of The Great American West, chief among them Old Faithful.

Old geezers

The geezer in Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming erupts every 44 minutes to two hours, rather less frequently than the Scary One.

And it is known to spew 3,700 to 8,400 gallons of boiling water to a height of 106 to 185ft feet lasting from a minute and half to five minutes.

Wyoming lays claim to most of the 3,500sq mile Yellowstone Park, while Montana and Idaho also own some of it.

And much of it is covered by the Father of the National Parks Scot John Muir, who hails from just along the road from us here in Dunbar, East Lothian.

Wyoming’s footprint on Yellowstone is undeniable but more contentious is their ownership of Buffalo Bill.

Fits the Bill

A good old Wild West row has brewed ever since William Cody died in 1917 in Denver, Colorado.

The Coloradans make a big thing, as you would, of that and any visitor to Denver should check out The Buffalo Bill Grave and Museum on Lookout Mountain.

Thing is though that the good people of Wyoming claim Bill for themselves and insist that it is a vagrant who rests for eternity in Colorado.

And they celebrate the superstar cowboy in the Buffalo Bill Center of the West.

We’ll maybe leave that to Wyoming and Colorado to fight over and just be grateful that it’s double bubble.

Buffalo Bill, of course, was a global star of his time on account of his touring Rough Riders which included one Sitting Bull.

Little Big Horn

And you can see where he and Crazy Horse had their greatest triumph in Little Big Horn, across the border in Montana.

Now if you have a middling or less knowledge of the Mid West don’t beat yourself up over it… as even American History students are always learning.

I don’t know where Ted Ransen is now but I hope he’s on a ranch.

Because he knocked the narrow-minded Scottishness out of me when he told me that if I didn’t know the capital of North Dakota then how should I expect Americans to know the capital of Scotland.

You don’t forget things like this.. it’s Bismarck.

And finally the US is the gift that keeps on giving and you can always rely on America The Old Faithful.

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Our own world bank of foreign exchange