Shopping and phones

Lets get the bad news out of the way first, as they say plans rarely survive contact with reality. Before getting here I had planned and promised regular (if not daily) blog updates from the trail, unfortunately this wont be happening now.
Don't worry I can hear you shouting why, well lets say I had my first taste of US mobile phone carries and I have to say I'm that I am surprised how bad the plans that are on offer are.
My requirements are
1. A SIM card (I already have a phone)
2. No contract (pay as you go, I'm only here for a few months)
3. Be able to make and receive calls
4. Be able to use internet/email
5. Reasonable coverage along the trail.

For anybody coming from Europe the first four items probably sound easy and if you browse some of the US sites like I did you might think it would be easy.

Well lets review the issues I had.

Firstly the question of coverage narrowed the realistic choices down to either Verizon or AT&T, no problem at least I have a choice :)

So Verizon seemed to have slightly better coverage from looking at the coverage reports on WWW.pctmaps.net

Unfortunalty Verizon do not offer any options to purchase a SIM only package, or at least not one that will allow voice calls, they do have SIMs but they are aimed at data only e.g. ipads and such, since I already have a very nice smart phone with me this is not much of an option for me.

So still not a big deal, I'm sure AT&T will want to take my money.

When I first start talking to the nice agent in the shop things are looking good, they have a nice package for $60 a month that seems to do everything I want, unlimited calls and unlimited internet including calls to Ireland, looks good doesn't it.....
That is what I was thinking as well until the bomb was dropped as they they say, the agent then mentioned that the unlimited internet part of the plan did not apply to smart phones,  that option is only available with a contract or on older non smart phones.

So instead of one of them getting at least 300 dollars off me over the next six months they will only get maybe 50 as I took the cheapest plan that simply lets me make calls and texts and pay for them as I go.

One item in the plan compares favourable to plans at home and that is 10c/minute national calls and 49c/minute calls to Ireland, this is well below the rate you pay at home on a basic pay as you go plan, but it's not all good, compared to home, you pay both to make and receive calls and texts here, so even if I only have incoming calls my credit is getting eaten up :(

So what does all this mean for the blog, well basically it means that I will only be posting updates when I can either get wifi coverage or get some other means of getting internet access. So please do not be surprised if it ends up being weeks between actual posts, to make up for this I have gotten a SPOT which I will use to provide basic updates, I'll post more about this in a day or so.

So other than my time battling phone companies, yesterday was a day filled with shopping and arranging some other final items.

I have to say that so far I am really enjoying San Diego, it feels very different to most other American cities I have been in (mostly east coast) it has an excellent public transport system so it is very easy to get around to the shops I need, so far I have only had to resort to taxis once or twice and that was more for convience than necessity.

At this point I probably have all the equipemnt I need to actually hit the trail (other than food, that's for today)
I will make a seperate post in the next few days with equipment details.

On the aggenda for today is food.shopping and looking at some of the gear that I got yesterday to make sure nothing is missing and to familiarize myself with some of it, as well as arranging to send my bounce box on ahead with unneeded items.

My current plans involve getting started on the trail on Monday (I have added and extra day in San Diego to see some more of the sights)

Well I think that will do for now, more posts to follow.