Using Mobile On Med Cruise To Keep In Touch Onboard too

Smag

We (two adults and two kids 14, 12) are going on a cruise around the med next year.

The ship is Independence Of The Seas, Royal Caribbean and very large. I have read that mobile phones can be used onboard but I dread t think what the charges will be for a ship of American ownership sailing around Europe!

The kids are sms'ers as most youngsters and I suppose that will be the best and cheapest way for them to keep in touch with friends and I will make sure they have no voicemail activated and all their friends know not to call them.

I was wondering if there is a way of using our mobile phones while onboard to keep in touch with each other? The ship is so large and the kids will be off exploring from the first minute not to be seen again until their money runs out I suppose.

Will we be better off just texting each other too? I can't see them carrying a walkie talkie. :rotfl:

Thanks

Steven

macman

Actually I think the little pocket size walkie talkies might be your best option. You can usually get a set of two for about £20.

doelani

Hi

As you say to use mobile onboard wil be very expesive. You need to check with their provider the cost of using the mobiles abroad and best thing t do is wait until ship is docked in ports.

We went a few weeks ago and kids ( well big kids) only used the texts when the mobile network showed as a italian, french network etc depending which country we were in .

I cannot rememeber what the network is that royal caribbean use but it is a satalitte one and as well as your network chargeing you they will charge and I cannnot remember the cost but know it is expensive.

Another work is the internet onbard , it is 55c a minute to use a really slow, Just getting on and checking email cost me over $3 alone and it soon adds up if using everyday. When we could we used internet cafe on land .

I am on O2 simplicity and to use my mobile for texting was free ( within reason ) and each text took 4 of my free ones, my daughter was o2 contract and she was charged for her texts , I think 35p each. I think o2 PAYG use the 4 texts for 1 from your free ones if that helps but like I say remember to limit to in port/on land network.

Enjoy your cruise

Bertie

Just off our third Indie cruise out of Southampton.
We use our Virgin PAYG triband phones to keep the 8 of us in touch using TEXTS.
At sea calls /text are via the US and texts were 25p each to send, 0p to receive.
The internal cell mast system they use works pretty much everywhere on board including in cabins.
Once close to shore and in ports they turn the internal system off and you log into the local carrier and pay european rates 11p texts on Virgin. Virgin texted us the rates each time we changed country.
The local carrier signal can vary on board and rarely worked in the cabins, but to be honest this was not a problem as on shore days we were together or up on deck so no signal problems.
For us Oldun's we pre made a set of text templates like "Where are you ?" and "meet us at the room" etc to save it interferring in valuable cocktail drinking time

We tried walkie talkies a few years ago, were pretty much useless in such a great mass of steel.
HTH's

mrsr

If at sea your charged normal roaming rates if they're close enough to land to pick up the local network coverage.
However, once you've moved out to sea there's a point when they won't be able to use land signal anymore and will automatically swap to a satellite service. There won't be any notification of this and the price of these calls are £6 per minute. (dependent on network )

mrcamp

As you alluded to, your best best will be to just use text. As others said, when you are at port or near port when the ship network has been turned off, then it's okay to use voice since you will be paying the EU ratee then. Royal Caribbean cruise lines use a company called "cellular At Sea", which is some kind of agreement with AT&T. Regardless it's painfully expensive to us it for voice calls. Not sure about UK carriers, but AT&T charges a whopping $2.49/min. I will assume the equivalent for UK carriers too.

http://www.cellularatsea.com/