So you're heading to camp in America this summer. You're excited, nervous and full of questions. One of your questions is how can I stay in touch with friends and family at home, stay on top of the latest TikTok trends and post about my own summer experience? This blog will help manage your expectations and hopefully save you a few pennies too.
As we mentioned in The Ultimate Summer Camp Packing List blog, while you're at camp you will be using your phone a lot less than you do now. Camps are increasingly becoming places for kids the disconnect from their devices, with many camps introducing zero screen policies and in many cases this applies to the staff too. Before you panic or change your mind on going to camp hear us out. You can still take your phone, tablet and laptop to camp with you, check with your camp about their policy and see if they allow staff to connect to Wifi. In many camps you will have time off to go and use your phone or the computer room to connect to loved ones outside of camp. To be honest with you, you're going to find it super refreshing not being on your phone all day and being able to connect with people face to face without being a distracted.
Why are we telling you this? The answer, we always get asked "do I need to buy an American SIM card" and although we think the answer is no, we want to provide you with information so you can make the best decision for you.
The reason we say no is because most people who work at camp spend around 11 or 12 weeks in the US. They work their 8-10 week camp contract, travel for a week or two and head home. As we said above, while you're at camp you're going to be using your phone less so you can try and do without. Once camp is over you're going to go travelling and unless you're hiking the Appalachian Trail you're going to have access to WiFi almost everywhere.
Still set on getting a sim card? That's your call, we advise getting an e-SIM in stead of a US SIM card.
What's an e-SIM?
An e-Sim is an embedded SIM card which means it's built into your device's hardware and works 100% digitally. Essentially it works alongside your current SIM meaning you don't have to take it out of your phone for the summer. The upsides of an e-SIM is that work in multiple countries and they should connect to any service provider in the area. SIM cards in comparison are restricted to their own companies service masts. For example, if you buy a AT&T SIM card but the masts in the area are T-Mobile then you won't have very good signal.
In 2021 and 2022 we used Airalo as our e-SIM of choice. We travelled to Mexico before heading to camp in 2021 and travelled around a few States after camp both years. The Airalo e-SIM was great at keeping us connected when meeting up with friends who travelled separately from us. It was affordable and we just bought the amount of data we needed without having to commit to over spending on unnecessary amounts. This is why we recently chose to partner with Airalo, because we trust the product. If you're going to get an e-SIM head to Airalo to gets yours. We are partnered with Airalo, that means we make a commission if you purchase a plan with them.
If you do go ahead and get yourself an e-SIM just follow these simple instructions to get set up:
Still want to get a US SIM card? Our advice is to speak to your camp and ask them which providers work best at camp. There is nothing worse than buying a SIM card, getting to camp only for it to not have any signal - trust us we've been there, it was a waste of $45.
If you want to ask any questions about using your phone at camp please don't hesitate to reach out!
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