Canadian Needs internet in US while in parks and on the road

Get a Verizon or AT&T Mi-fi device. You can get pay as you go and need to load via gift card every month. When you go back to Canada, just stop loading gift cards. Walmart sells them....coverage is real good....buy the cheapest for the GB you need to use.

As a fellow Canadian I have a couple of possibilities for you. I agree that the park wifi systems don't cut it, overused and temperamental.A wifi booster won't help, it's not the signal strength but the system itself.

Over the years we have used different systems. We carry a tripod satellite internet system (with a Hughes service provided through Galaxy Broadband in Ontario), it's reliable (signal can be gotten anywhere including Alaska, the NWT and Mexico) but slow and we will retire it when the contract expires next year.

We currently use an AT&T wifi hotspot (around $50 for the hotspot and $50 per month for 5 gigs/month), it's pay as you go and I pause it when back home, if you use it within a year it remains active. You can refill monthly on-line or get refill cards at WalMart. The unit is handy when on the road moving from park to park or on the road.

Depending on the RV park, you may be able to sign up for internet service, the park we are in has cable TV and the supplier will set campers up with cable internet with wireless modem for about $60/month, it's even cheaper if you split teh cost with your neighbour, the wireless signal reaches both campers.

What I'm seeing on the Walmart website is a Mobile Hot Spot from Straight talk and AT&T. All the plans are from Straight Talk. Is this what you're talking about? I don't want to mess up (lol)

Janie Ryan wrote:
What I'm seeing on the Walmart website is a Mobile Hot Spot from Straight talk and AT&T. All the plans are from Straight Talk. Is this what you're talking about? I don't want to mess up (lol)

Here is the hotspot I have:

link

The airtime cards like this one are available in Walmart stores or at Best Buy in the US:

link

I signed up at the AT&T website to refill my account instead of going through the hassle of going to the stores. It's monthly via credit card, a month or any amount at a time, no contract. If you need that link I can provide.

A couple of hassles: WalMart in US won't accept non-US credit cards for on-line purchases, so you have to go into the stores. AT&T doesn't recognize non-US addresses for the on-line refill but I put in the US address we are staying at and the Canadian CC charge went through.

I was looking at Cricket, now owned by AT&T, you may want to look at them.

Hi Janie:
last winter we used Wind Mobile (now Freedom) and I was very happy.
Wind used T-Mobile and AT&T when in the US. I bought plans (Canadian and US) for each of our phones and that gave me an Alberta (Edmonton) number. The plan I used had Canadian and US minutes and internet.
It might be worth while to look into them and give them a call.
Since your Edmonton, it might work very well for you.
Good luck.

The hotspot idea is expensive if you use a lot of GB. The $50 card thru Verizon that we had last year was used up in less than a week. just surfing the net not downloading anything like movies.

You may find some campgrounds with great wifi. We are finding that the smaller parks that don't have a lot of other amenities, do have great wifi. rvparkreviews.com can help. Someone usually mentions the quality of the wifi if a park has it.

almcc wrote:
As a fellow Canadian I have a couple of possibilities for you. I agree that the park wifi systems don't cut it, overused and temperamental.A wifi booster won't help, it's not the signal strength but the system itself.

Over the years we have used different systems. We carry a tripod satellite internet system (with a Hughes service provided through Galaxy Broadband in Ontario), it's reliable (signal can be gotten anywhere including Alaska, the NWT and Mexico) but slow and we will retire it when the contract expires next year.

We currently use an AT&T wifi hotspot (around $50 for the hotspot and $50 per month for 5 gigs/month), it's pay as you go and I pause it when back home, if you use it within a year it remains active. You can refill monthly on-line or get refill cards at WalMart. The unit is handy when on the road moving from park to park or on the road.

Depending on the RV park, you may be able to sign up for internet service, the park we are in has cable TV and the supplier will set campers up with cable internet with wireless modem for about $60/month, it's even cheaper if you split teh cost with your neighbour, the wireless signal reaches both campers.

all of the refills I see for AT&T show expiry dates of 30 to 90 days max...don't see any on Walmart that expire in a year?

The expiry of 1 year isn't for the refill cards, it's for the "phone number" for the hot spot itself. You can (as I did) let the hotspot sit inactive (with no monthly $$ put in) over the period you are not in the US and just buy a card when you return the next winter season as long as it isn't over a year.

I tried to find this detail in my documentation but couldn't. I would call AT&T to confirm. I called them 866-707-5550 (that's the activation number for the hotspot) to get the info.

On edit, I found the info on the website about halfway down the page on the right:

link

Be careful - you don't say where you're traveling. We have Verizon wifi/mifi BUT there are many many times where there's no cell phone signal, so the wifi/mifi is useless - particularly true "out west". So if you plan on using it for work, you may be disappointed and headed to some remote town to find a "real" wifi signal. We were disappointed the last two years on how often we could get a signal with Verizon. Good luck!