Keeping in touch inside the parks...cell phone??

[obnurse2003]

I am going into hiding here!

I am afraid that this is also a touchy subject but one I need to ask.

If my DH decides to go one way with my DD and I go another with my DS, what is the best way to communicate inside the parks. I know all about meeting at a place at a certain time but what if we are in line for a ride and will be late for that meeting? Does anyone have any experience with this? Walkie-talkies perhaps? Morse code??

 

[coli]

Hi there - I know walkie talkies are a popular item along with the ever present cellphone/pager.

Wow a month and a half to go! That's nothing! In a hundred days I'lll be where you are now.... have fun.

 

[queenvic]

We used our cell phones and they worked fine - better than the walkie talkies.

 

[DrTomorrow]

Cell phones (on vibrate for courtesy's sake) work fine for DW and I. We each carry a flare gun as a fall-back, but those don't work as well indoors.

 

[Eeyore2U]

Cell Phones work fine.

 

[swilphil]

We had four adults in our group, each with different phones and companies. All our phones worked great. In MGM, and a little at MK, there were a few places where they wouldn't work, but just turn the corner and you'll be fine. I turned my phone off during shows though.

 

[CarolA]

I don't like using cell phones. we found that at least one of the phones was ALWAYS in a dead spot and mine spends all it's battery power looking for a signal in the attractions (and YES it is on vibrate!)

 

[cindy_k]

We also use Cellphones (on Vibrate). Works great across parks, and takes Voicemails if other person is in a show.

Plus we have nationwide calling so it doesn't cost anything extra.

Have a good trip!

 

[helenm29]

I personnally like W/Talkies. Now they have a 5 mile range and you can select a specific channel for you and your family to be on without the interferance (?) that you used to get with the old ones. My oldest son, hubby and I all have one...the two 10 year olds stick with one of us. Good Luck!

 

[Disneylovers]

I'd put my vote in for the walkie talkie also. We used them on our last trip, and they worked fine! (we didn't have nationwide long distance on our cell phones, so this was our only option!). They were especially useful when DH & older DD grabbed supper, while younger DD & I got seats for Fantasmic, made it much easier for them to find us!

 

[TestTrackBoy]

When we went down last year, we all had Nextel Cell Phones, with the walkie talkie feature. It worked very well all over the parks, I even had a signal in the rides!

 

[helenm29]

Hey Testtrackboy - How did you like Yacht Club Concierge? we're staying there soon and I'm curiouse?

Also, for Nextel...is it very expensive and does the plan come with two phones? I think that may be a little bit of a downfall compaired to using Walkie Talkies because you can have multiple Walkie Talkies without being too expensive. Helen

 

[angey77]

We tried the walky-talkies once and got too much interferance from other people doing the same, especially if the weather started getting bad. Some kid got on my signal and thought I was "mommy!"
Cell phones work great, but as with the above mentioned, bad weather equals hardly any connection since everyone is using them. What I found to work great was text messaging with my cell phone. No matter where you are and if the lines are jammed, you can do it and it goes though.
One place I know for certain there is a dead area is Space Mountain.

 

[TestTrackBoy]

helenm29, you have a Personal Message (PM) waiting for you.

 

[Lesley]

We're probably going to try our cell phones next time....before now we only had one, but now that dh has one for work we may use both at the parks. I know when we stayed at POR last year though, we couldn't get a signal at the resort at all.

We have some walkie talkies and found their use to be a bit limited....there are so many people using them in the parks, and if someone in your group has a common name (like "Dave") you'll often get the wrong person even if the name is right! I had some poor kid (probably a 10-12 year old) thinking I was his mom too.

Unless you have some really great Walkie Talkies with a million channels and privacy features, I wouldn't entirely rely on them. Too many others are using them in the parks.

That said, when we moved from PA to SC they were really useful....dh and I kept in touch as he drove the moving truck and I drove our van. But we had to stay within a mile or so of each other.

 

[Dan Murphy]

Cell phone, on vibrate, and in shirt pocket (except on rides) so I can 'hear' it. Works great.

 

[crystalb]

We use only cell phones, and have for months. (No house phones. Great way to end annoying telemarketing calls. )
I never can understand why people try to use phones and walkie talkies so much. It's noisy! Between music, parades, crowds, general noise, people are clumped in corners, bent over their phones/talkies, hand over their free ear, yelling into the phone/talkie. And everyone around can hear every word. Usually it's: Whatcha doing? Are you up yet? What are you wearing?

 

[newarknut]

We've gone to using cell phones. If you hear it and answer it, great. If you don't answer, you can check your voicemail and still stay connected.