Cruise to Alaska - Will my phone work?

Hey. I'm going on a cruise to Alaska and i was just wondering if i would get service up there. I have a v551 and i kno that in some places the towers only support certain frequencies. So does anyone kno if it will work?

Thanks

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c'mon! does anyone know???

I was in Anchorage in December and my phone worked fine. The bill was pretty high though, I think because I was roaming and didn't know it

Thanks...i hav a national plan so i shouldnt get charged roaming right?

Not sure... Might wanna try calling Cingular customer service to be 100% sure

You should not be charged roaming.

As for reception, you'll probably be fine when you're close to a city, outside of that it could be sketchy.

I would think that large cruise ships could provide equipment to make a cell phone repeater almost, maybe through satellite or otherwise that would relay cell calls via satellite to the regular cell network... but I have no idea.

Thats tough, you might get hit with international rates. Remember that the national plan only works while your in the nation, not out to sea. As for reception, thats a REALLY good question.. one of my friends works on an oil rig and he gets reception on it.. BUT his is tmobile. He had a cingular phone before and it didnt work out that far..

Please post here when you get back, I really want to know if it worked out that far.

i'm leaving for the cruise on thursday. thats what i thought too, BrianSkibinski, i would think that they would have some sort of satalite hookup.

From what i understand they have computers that they have on the ship so i'll try to get on them and let you know.

The brochure didn't mention anything about cell phones but they did say you could make calls to the land "for a reasonable fee of $7.25 per minute". When i read that I was like "REASONABLE?!?!?!?!???? $7.25??!!???!!!?" Well hopefully i wont have to make a call that bad.

Hope you enjoy your trip! Alaska is one of my fave places to visit and also the most beautiful!

BTW, bring bug repellant! Those mosquitoes are vicious in the summer

Right now i'm off the coast of Vancouver and I do get service...but it's probalby because i am so close to land. My cell is connected to some company called Rogers Wireless and all I have been doing is text messaging cus i dont want to get charged international rates. I will let you guys know what the service is like when i get to Alaska

We went on an Alaskan Cruise and there was only one port where I didn't get service,

I'm back. It was great up there...many good memories. I got good service at all 3 ports we stopped at (juneau, skagway, ketchecan) but as soon as we were about 3 or 4 miles out to sea there was no more service.

Ahhh!! I took that cruise and LOVED it! What CruiseLine were you on? Did you see many orca and Humpback? i have loads of pictures of swirls on the water that I can narrate "Oh! That one was this adorable baby humpback" One time our ship nearly stopped because there was a black bear on the shore and all the passengers wanted pictures... I didn't... that was the furthest away I'd ever seen a black bear in the wild, I wanted Grizzlies!

I understand the big/new ships do have cell service aboard - but you will pay the roaming fee to the cruise line for the use. Its probably less than the ship-to-shore $7.25 either way.

It was so much fun! I was on the Royal Carribean's Radience of the Seas. Apparently the ship is pretty new...but it didnt have the cell service.

The ship could hold just under 1 million gallons of gas (300 or so liters) and only gets 60 to 70 feet per gallon. When i learned that i was like "HOLY CRAP!!!"...that must be one hell of a gas bill. $200 million dollars for a full tank of gas.
I also learned that the particular ship i was on could go about 27 knots full speed and can come to a full stop from 27 knots in just 400 yards. It would take just about any other ship 4 to 6 miles to come to a full stop from 27 knots.

Well basically i had fun and for those of you that havent been on a cruise yet...you should.