Communications on board

I am a communications freak so for other communications freaks here’s a rundown of my experiences aboard the cruise ship Costa Romantica:

Phone calls

Cellular coverage: In principle only on or near land but Costa has an arrangement with TIM, Italy’s largest mobile operator, where they have TIM cellphone coverage on board at a cost of 2 Euro /min for incoming and outgoing calls. In addition Costa satellite phone service from one’s cabin at the bargain price of $5/minute. I don’t pay prices like that….

I had bought a small Thuraya phone in Dubai last December and thought that this cruise would be the perfect opportunity to test it out. Call costs are reasonable by satellite standards ($1.50 /minute – comparable to the roaming costs of the Israeli mobile operators) but coverage turned out to be spotty at best.

Internet

As reported in a separate item, Internet access on the ship was very basic so I got used to doing the minimum necessary on board and waiting for port stops for the heavier stuff (uploading photos, uploading and downloading email). On ship I checked out the places in the next port where I could get free WiFi (wireless internet) access and, once in port, I would go hunting for my fix.

Once or twice I managed while at sea to connect my laptop to the Internet through the Thuraya GmPRS satellite service but the connection was not very reliable and very slow.

GPS

It’s not really communications but I want to brag a bit….Ever since almost getting lost after dark in the Negev (desert in Israel) a few years ago I promised myself to have GPS (Global Positioning System) device whenever I don’t know exactly where I am. But coordinates without maps aren’t very helpful so I turned to my mate Admiral (retired) Shabtai who supplied me with some marine navigation software with maps. In the beginning it was quite fun tracking where we were but since I came to the conclusion that the ship’s captain knew where to go, I gradually desisted and went over to other games. Oh well…