Cell Phones in Europe - Any ideas

[ben ward]

Any ideas for tempory use of cell phones while on a mediteranian cruise or just use email and skype over the internet?

Thanks,
Ben

[tkdsl]

Most have service with your current cell service provider and they go with ATT on the ship to provide roaming access to make calls.

[davejohn]

I've never used it, but a lot of folks recommend the Mobal GSM phone.

http://www.mobalrental.com/gsm/handsets.asp

[Bobbie]

You can rent cell phones in the airport that you're arriving at & leaving out of. It's pretty simple to do & you can buy plans with a certain amount of minutes.

[evgal]

we bought the the $99 phone from mobal, good little phone but last yr we got $99/ minutes free. so we're set for this yr, have enough min. left. we rented a car in corfu & liked the security of having the phone. the yr before we lost someone in our party in london, was really scary, had to scramble to get change for the pay phone!!! no more lol!

[ShipMaven]

My BlackBerry Curve/AT&T is quad band with international service. I've used it from Europe to Hong Kong, at sea, in Canada, Mexico, Central/South America. And it's my everyday cell phone.

[Conniemc]

ALL CRUISE LINES now have cell phone access, EXCEPT PRINCESS. It's been reported in all the cruise news.

Celebrity, RCCL, Carnival, HAL...all now have cell phone access. It doesn't matter how great your phone is, if the ship isn't anywhere near a tower, you need to be on a ship that has it's own cell tower. Most do. For some reason, Princess doesn't.

However, unless you have some pressing reason to need to communicate while on vacation, stick with e-mail. Cheaper. I vacation to NOT COMMUNICATE and escape. Oh well.

[Conniemc]

Update, I had a signal 24/7 on my Med cruise...I had to return two business calls and put out a couple of fires back home. Since the ship "hugged" the countries pretty close (you almost always saw land), I'm sure the provider I was getting (different each day) was land based.

[elcruzer]

Update, I had a signal 24/7 on my Med cruise...I had to return two business calls and put out a couple of fires back home. Since the ship "hugged" the countries pretty close (you almost always saw land), I'm sure the provider I was getting (different each day) was land based.

What was the charge for these calls?

[silverservice]

as mentioned, if your cell phone is tri or quad band,it will work in europe.
it will log on to the local network. regards, mike, southampton, england.