LotsaPasta

I used my iphone exactly as you are planning last November in Italy. I found wifi everywhere and texted everyone for free. It did not even occur to me to use Facetime, though I dont really use that at home either. I also bought a cheap calling card from a Tabac (do they call it that in ITaly?) in case I wanted to actually talk to someone. It ended up coming in handy for a lengthy conversation to the airline when my reservation got goofy. Hope your trip is fantastic!

Honeybear

good idea, LotsaPasta. I do know that it reqires wifi and the rates we were quoted were way higher than the rates you mention gh21...so we will be happy doing the wifi thing and the free stuff....

thanks for the good wishes....can't wait to get there already!!

ciao!

rosebuds

We are headed to Rome tomorrow and downloaded the viber app. Many of my friends that have traveled abroad have used it too.....Free text and calls, not high quality and you need wifi, but it will do the trick for us.

DebitNM

Viber has actually worked well for us in the past.

socaltraveler

We are currently traveling in Europe, and are using wifi and Skype to make any calls back to the US that we deem necessary. .01 cent a minute.