Satellite Internet - Short Term Rental?

[scottandgaye]

We normally try to completely disconnect ourselves from the outside world when we take our summer vacation (4-5 weeks) each year to the Greater Yellowstone Area (Yellowstone and the Tetons). We have been doing this for many years and are familiar with where there is and is not cellular access. We always get reservations at Madison, but try to move to Norris as soon as possible, as it is our favorite location and is most central to the areas of the park we enjoying seeing.

The issue this year is my wife's elderly mother. We more or less need to be available at less than a 24 hour notice. I was hoping to find a Hughes Net or equivalent that could be rented for a daily or monthly rate. We could then access our email from her assisted living facility or make low data rate phone calls from within the RV.

Is anyone aware of a company that provides this type of service. I very much want to avoid any long term contracts (as in more than a minimum of 2-3 months), even though we only need it for one month. If someone has suggestions on what I am looking for, please let me know. And by they way, I have already ruled out a satellite phone. That IS too expensive.

Thanks for any help you guys can provide!

Scott and Gaye
Allen, TX

[scottandgaye]

Thanks to everyone for the info. Been out of town and haven't had time to check the forum. I appreciate the help. I still don't have a solution to this, but am leaning toward renting a satellite phone as an emergency backup to the spotty cellular coverage in both parks. Expensive and not ideal, but will meet the requirement.

[TechWriter]

Give www.satellitephonestore.com a look see.

I looked at renting an Inmarsat BGAN terminal for both phone and Internet.

The terminal is pricey to rent, the phone/data plan is very expensive, and the data rate is really, really slow -- but it may fit your bill for a month or so.

[Gulfcoast]

So, how long (in hours) would it take to drive in range of a cell tower?

[Bill_Satellite]

bob_nestor wrote:

scottandgaye wrote:

The issue this year is my wife's elderly mother. We more or less need to be available at less than a 24 hour notice. I was hoping to find a Hughes Net or equivalent that could be rented for a daily or monthly rate. We could then access our email from her assisted living facility or make low data rate phone calls from within the RV.

If all you need is e-mail, light internet access and phone service, what's wrong with a smart phone and going with one of the many no-contract services? Virgin Mobile, StraightTalk, etc all offer these at about $35/mo no-contract. You need one of their phones, but you can get a basic smart phone for under $100. And since you're in the Allen area if you're interested in Virgin Mobile I have a working HTC One V that I'm not using. You can have it if you'd like.

The problem is that there is NO cellular service in nearly all of Yellowstone and those are his camping plans.

[bob_nestor]

scottandgaye wrote:

The issue this year is my wife's elderly mother. We more or less need to be available at less than a 24 hour notice. I was hoping to find a Hughes Net or equivalent that could be rented for a daily or monthly rate. We could then access our email from her assisted living facility or make low data rate phone calls from within the RV.

If all you need is e-mail, light internet access and phone service, what's wrong with a smart phone and going with one of the many no-contract services? Virgin Mobile, StraightTalk, etc all offer these at about $35/mo no-contract. You need one of their phones, but you can get a basic smart phone for under $100. And since you're in the Allen area if you're interested in Virgin Mobile I have a working HTC One V that I'm not using. You can have it if you'd like.

[Tom_M1]

You may want to look into renting a satellite phone. Do a Google search for "satellite phone rental".

[Bill_Satellite]

It's not just a more expensive option, it's a WAY more expensive options. Think in the terms of many hundreds of dollars per month to rent satellites internet service.
Don't bother with the Hughesnet Gen4 service mentioned above as it is not mobile.

[scottandgaye]

Thanks for the great responses. I'll give the one in Va beach a call. Like I said, we know where the cell towers are in each of the parks, but it's not always convenient to trudge down there. My goal would be to find a decent rate mobile satellite system that I can rent for a month (or two or three) depending on their requirements. Yes, it is a more expensive solution, but in this case, time doing what we want to do in the park is more important to us than the time driving down to old faithful or up to Mammoth to get cell coverage. But, if anyone else knows of or has used a satellite data provider on a monthly basis, please let me know. Thanks again for the help!

Scott

[Bill_Satellite]

Give MobilSat in Va. Beach a call. They do offer rental but I am not sure it will be an affordable option for what you want. There is some cellular in the park and some wifi in some of the campgrounds so you may be able to use your cellular connection to get your email. Worst case you can always drive to W. Yellowstone daily to make you e-mail checks or phone calls. While not convenient, it sure would be cheaper!

[RoyB]

If your VERIZON CELL PHONEs work there then the VERIZON MIFI PLAN would be the best plan to get for low internet use.

The MILLENICOM PLAN uses the VERIZON NETWORK for the internet and is a NO CONTRACT service I think. This will give you up to 20GB of data service to us for around $70 a month.

Also HUGHESNET has come up with a new Gen4 service plan that is the next generation of high-speed satellite Internet that will let you do more of what you want online. Might want to check with that as well for that area. Their new plan starts at $40 a month

Roy Ken

[rvjames]

These services exist but they are just very expensive if you need them on a temporary basis. Most of these services market to oil exploration, mining industry, etc. Where the cost is not an issue most times. I did a google search and could not find anything less than $200 a month with very expensive data rates.