I have read some nightmare stories about charges for the usage of the iphone or ipad in Europe on a cruise.

I think that I will be OK, but thought I'd run my thoughts by someone here. My experience is that Fodorites are my best reference for anything travel related.

1. iPhone - My service is through Virgin. They do not have service in Europe and so said there should be no roaming charges. (I will be able to use if if I find a location for wifi.)

2. iPad - I pay for the cellular on a month by month basis - normally just when I am going on a trip. If I do not pay for the cellular, I would think that I would alleviate any chance of connecting to something unexpectedly expensive.

I will be satisfied with having access only when there is free wifi somewhere. I just don't want to accidentally do something that will create unexpected charges.

Thanks for your help.

In general, wifi is very expensive on a cruise. It's usually sold in packages, the more minutes you purchase, the cheaper it is, relatively speaking. It would be very difficult to inadvertently incur charges as you have to "sign up" for a package and when your minutes are used up service is cut off.

Are you on an ocean or river cruise? In the ports you can find free wifi. I've never heard of a free service on an ocean cruise, which is not to say it doesn't exist. You can obtain details from your cruise line before you sail.

We recently switched our cell phone service to T Mobile, which gives us free unlimited data in 100 countries. We used our iPhones to guide us around Paris, look up restaurants, etc, and all at no charge.

You will need to turn off the cellular function on your phone and iPad, otherwise it will seek out any cellular signal and use it - and you will be charged for it! You want it to transmit only over wi-fi.

Catinjoetown - We are on a sea cruise, I suppose you could say - the Baltic. I agree - there won't be any free service on the ship, that's for sure. But I thought I might find something in a port - at a McDonalds or that sort of thing. (And at our pre and post hotels)

My goodness, Kathie, that sounds like a tremendous asset - being able to use your phone at will throughout Paris. I put off buying a smart phone much longer than most (OK all) of my friends, but now that I have one love the ability to research on the go. I am a little envious of you, but think I will stick to my current plan for now.

This is a somewhat out of date article but basically still applies as far as I know. We followed the instructions on the last several trips and have never used any data and been able to use the iphone and ipad all we needed. All of our hotels had free wifi. We have AT&T service and I never checked their
International rates. We also used Skype to make phone calls when in wifi.

http://holeinthedonut.com/2010/01/14...avel-settings/

I am very new to my iPad. I want to use it in London & Paris where there is wi-fi only.
I will not have a phone with me.
Are you telling me to turn off my facetime on my iPad that I use to call family? Or else I will receive a charge even if I'm not calling anyone?
Sorry if this is an ignorant question, as I said, I'm new to this.

Yes, you can find free wifi in the ports.

TPAY, if your iPad has data service over phone networks, that's what you have to turn off, not Facetime. Facetime will work with wifi. If your iPad doesn't have data services over cell phone networks, you don't need to turn off anything.

Traveller, I believe the Virgin cell phones are CDMA, so they wouldn't work on the cell phone networks (GSM) in Europe. It would be that, not the fact that Virgin doesn't have service in Europe, that would save you from the roaming charges. However, I would turn off data services anyway.

bvlenci---thanks, now I get it.