What a visitor's money does in Réunion: every guide rated from very cheap to very expensive, cheapest first, then the things that cost travellers money without buying anything — the ATM, the taxi, the SIM.
Euro (EUR) · 1 EUR = 1.13 USD · 1 EUR = 0.85 GBP
It is France: euros, cards everywhere, contactless in the supermarkets and at the fuel pumps. Cash is for the market stalls, the snack vans and some gîtes in the cirques, which are cash only and a long walk from a machine.
Avoid: walking into Mafate without cash for the gîtes, accepting conversion into your home currency at the machine
Use: Crédit Agricole, BRED, Banque de La Réunion, La Banque Postale
Cards work almost everywhere, as in mainland France. The mountain gîtes and some market stalls are cash only.
Creole cooking is the everyday food: a cari or a rougail saucisse with rice, beans and a chilli rougail on the side, served in heaps. Samoussas and bouchons from the snack vans, Cilaos lentils and wine, and rhum arrangé, which every bar steeps itself.
The cost rating is this site's own, for a visitor, from the guides' authors and the corrections readers send in. The general rules — the conversion prompt, shoulder season, the airport taxi — are in budget travel tips.
