How travellers stay connected *

There was a time when travelling around the world meant you had to go weeks without receiving news from home, and your loved ones had to trust that you were still alive in between all the letters you sent. Thankfully, communication is now more instantaneous ad wide-reaching, so you never have to wait to long to get in touch with your parents, friends, and loved ones while you’re on your adventure. Whether you’re in a well-connected city, or in a village in the middle of nowhere, here is how travellers stay connected to home.

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Virtual post box

Despite the presence of technology, there are some forms of communication that are still present as hard-copies; bills, contracts, or letters from pen pals. If you don’t know where you’re going to be on a certain date, or how long you’re going to stay there once you arrive, you run the risk of missing important mail while you’re travelling. Fortunately, you can have all your post redirected to a virtual post box; physicaladdress.com allows you to set up a post box anywhere in the world, and they will virtualise all physical mail and upload it to your online post box. In your online mailbox, you may request content scans, forward packages, forward envelopes, filter out unwanted mail, and organize and store items. You never have to miss important documents ever again, no matter where you are.

Travel SIM cards

Even taking emails and instant messaging into account, sometimes you can beat a long phone call with your mum. Unfortunately, there’s always a risk that you’ll rack up huge roaming charges if you spend too long talking. However, you can save up to 95 percent on your roaming chargers; a travel SIM will give you free international roaming, cheap calls, SMS and data in most countries. This means you can answer your phone without being charged in the majority of countries and check Facebook without the fear of extortionate charges.

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Skype

You might have already used Skype to make video calls home when you have a strong laptop connection, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. As long as you have a wifi network around, you can use Skype to make both video and voice calls, as well as send messages to your friends and family. You can even make calls to mobiles and landlines if you add some credit to your Skype plan. As long as you use a wifi connection, you’ll avoid extra charges to your roaming plan.

Mobile wifi hotspot

Most of the methods for staying in touch with loved ones, or keeping up with your online business, involve a steady wifi connection. If you’re visiting a place where the connection is a bit unsteady, then it’s a good idea to invest in your own mobile wifi hotspot. TEP offers a pocket Wi-Fi hotspot which lets you connect up to five devices at once. The battery lasts about eight hours (up to 20 on standby) and also has a Global Wi-Fi option that works in many countries around the world.