Communication is a big deal to us. Sure, it’ll be great to get away, but we still want to be able to connect with our family and friends back home.
Chances are very good we won’t be using our cellphones while we’re on the cruise once we leave Honolulu, except as cameras on airplane mode. I’ve heard horror stories about ginormous bills because of roaming charges on incoming texts, many of which might not even be of interest. Our carrier doesn’t offer international service at all, so trying to get some phone minutes would mean changing cell phone providers. Not really an option we want to pursue. So messaging on Facebook, emails, and this blog is going to be our best bet for staying in contact with our loved ones, and the outside world.
But internet access on the ship will be spotty at best and surely expensive, so I’m experimenting with ways to limit the amount of time I actually spend online.
To write this post today, I’m using Open Live Writer. It’s an offline program that was already installed on my computer, so I’m giving it a go. I’m hoping I can add photos to posts using this program.
So one way or another, this blog will become an important way to keep in touch.
And in case of a total emergency, we can always pay for a ship-to-shore phone call, but we want to avoid that if we can. It’s $49.50 for ten minutes.
With our luck, we’d just get to leave some very expensive messages on our loved ones’ answering machines!
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Ok, here are the results of this experiment. The post you see above has been gently massaged, not automatically published as I'd hoped. When I tried to publish the post, I got an error message. So I copied and pasted it with limited success. My words all made the transition, but I had to go through and re-paragraph it. No image was captured at all. It seems I'll have to add photos online.
Unless there's an experienced blogger out there who can help me troubleshoot how I'm using Open Live Writer, I'm not sure it will be more time efficient than writing a Word document offline and then copying and pasting.
Any suggestions?
Lexi, I am happy to try and answer questions regarding Open Live Writer. I've been using it successfully for years now (first as the original Windows Live Writer.) I'll be settled back in Houston tomorrow afternoon. I just sent you a FB friend request. We can then exchange emails via Messenger and go from there. Your call.
ReplyDeleteAs to the topic of this post. We opted to pay an additional $40/month for the Verizon international plan since that was our carrier at the time. Big mistake ... worked well to make phone calls (100 minutes per billing cycle) to guides and whatnot, and to family in Turkey, but included data was pitiful. A friend used T-Mobile for data and phone and had 4G in most places. We have since switched our carrier to T-Mobile entirely. Has been working great so far. Lower total bill in the US with unlimited data and phone (incl Canada and Mexico), and unlimited data (free) and phone internationally at 20 cents/minute. We will be testing our new plan during our upcoming trip to Europe.
We use the We Phone app for making calls over wi-fi when we are traveling ... and even here to call overseas. It worked ... even on the ship. We top off through PayPal.
For us the key to successful wi-fi use on the ship was timing ... finding the times when people were off doing other things ... like dinner/lunch, lectures, shows. We also found that figuring out where the routers are located and staying near them helped as well.
Welcome back to the States!
DeleteThanks so much for the offer to share your Open Live Writer expertise. I'll send you a message with my email address. I have tons of questions. The little FB message bubbles will not be adequate. I'll Google an online tutorial so I don't inundate you with stupid stuff. ;-)
We use Consumer Cellular at home. It's soooo much cheaper than the Verizon and TMobile accounts we had when we lived in Boston. I'm loath to give up that cheap service. I'm assuming we'd need to sign a contract for T-Mobile if we switched again.
Good tip on timing the wifi. How do you find out where the routers are? Will the computer guru on board tell?
The computer guru might tell you. I'm not familiar with Princess ships, but on O the routers were on the ceiling ... white boxes. So look around in the public areas and around your cabin.
DeleteWe did not have to sign a contract with T-Mobile when we switched from Verizon. If you can share a phone, you might consider buying an inexpensive model and getting T-Mobile for that one just for travel purposes. Since there is no contract, you could technically turn it on and off as needed ... worth asking at a T-Mobile store locally. By installing the WePhone app on that phone, you could also have a wi-fi calling alternative since making calls on WePhone would be so much cheaper. What'sApp is also an option for calling assuming both parties have the App. All that said, I'm not sure what the charges would be if someone called your phone from the US. We have an agreement with family that we will call them so they don't incur any charges.