Erik Finman is known in crypto circles for being the self-proclaimed youngest Bitcoin millionaire at age 18. In 2011, aged just 12-years-old, he invested $1,000 his grandmother gave to him in the cryptocurrency. At the time, one token would set you back around $12.

The Idaho native's entry into the Bitcoin universe came about because of a chance meeting at a protest. His older brother brought him to a demonstration against the arrest of activists who danced at the Jefferson Memorial, he explained.

"It was very much a footloose protest," he added. "Some guy had this orange 'B' that looked like a dollar sign on his shirt. Kind of half-joking I asked him what it was. And then you had a bunch of riot police and they told us all to leave. So, in the middle of running from the police, he was like: 'Oh, it's Bitcoin man, it's going to end Wall Street, bro.' And ran off."

After that, Finman said he and his older brother looked it up and became interested in alternative currencies. "I guess I was going through that rose-tinted-glasses, libertarian phase at the time — it kind of changed my views on the world. You know, when you're 12, that's crazy."

"How most kids felt about video games or sports, my pastime was Bitcoin," he told Euronews.

Now 21, Finman has grown his holdings in crypto money and built a multi-million dollar crypto company. He has also funded projects including the making of a real-life Dr Octopus suit, "which was very cool," as well as several other charity endeavours.

Has he noticed a change in perceptions of Bitcoin? "Now, it's getting a lot more establishment. I think a lot of that is to do with the cult around it. Not that it was too big to fail, but it had too fanatic a fanbase."

For the Bitcoin Family, 2018 was a year they had to ride out. Originally from the Netherlands, in the summer of 2017, they sold nearly all of their possessions and invested them in Bitcoin, with the goal of becoming "digital nomads", living a minimalistic lifestyle, powered by the digital currency.

"You can't look into the future. We live very simply, we live day-by-day," explained Didi Taihuttu, the Father of the Bitcoin Family.

"In 2018 we said to ourselves: 'We will take this year, we will go to live on campsites, live in nature, live in beautiful Asian countries, and we will see it as an adventure. How can we save as many Bitcoins as possible but still enjoy life?' A camper van in Portugal by the sea, sleeping for free, showering at the beach; all things kids never did before. And then the kids are like: 'Oh, yeah, that's an adventure. It's not our parents who are depressed because Bitcoin is going down.'"

And that's what the family did. After coming through 2018, they have been travelling and living the nomadic lifestyle they hoped the cryptocurrency would afford them for over three and a half years. "In 2018, life cost us one Bitcoin per month. Now, in 2020, one Bitcoin buys us a year," Taihuttu said.

He and his wife took their three daughters off in search of freedom and "not being part of the system anymore". For the first six months of their Bitcoin-powered travels, they kept their traditional bank accounts but for the last few years, they got rid of them and have only used cryptocurrency and crypto solutions. Before they got their first crypto debit card two years ago, they bought online Bitcoin coupons and exchanged them for groceries or McDonald's coupons, booking everything from flights and hotels online with Bitcoin.

"Of course, it's a little bit of a gamble," Taihuttu said. "But on the other side, it's only a gamble if you're not prepared to lose and for us, at that point in life, we clearly realised that money didn't have any value to us anymore. We were prepared to lose everything, all the money, all the luxury, because we didn't care about that anymore."

What does the future hold for the Bitcoin Family? "That's a very hard question. For me, I have traveller blood that wants to explore the whole world but we have already switched from very fast travelling to slow travelling. We stay in every country for a minimum of four or five months to really explore the country and to get to know the people, the culture."

Aside from continuing the charity work they have been involved in for several years, Taihuttu says the family is looking into creating some "digital nomad coworking living places" in Portugal and Thailand so his children and wife can have "social bases".