Originally Posted by
Machka
But there are a lot of places that don't have coverage, and when we've travelled overseas, we've opted not to get whatever you need to be able to make calls when in another country ... mostly because of the cost.
Agree in general with usefulness of first aid essentials in contrast with phone.
As far as phone overseas goes, I end up with one to get local SIM card, particularly if traveling with more than one person. This came in part when I cycled across Russia with one other person and we accidentally lost each other and ended up cycling independently for 10 days. In that instance, an ability to sync up via text message would have helped. Later on the trip, my brother cycled with us for a bit and brought a phone. We'd use twitter to send out an encoded version of our GPS coordinates and my parents could place a pin on the map. This was in remote parts of Siberia and there wasn't phone service every day, but we were following the railroad and at least every other day we'd come through town with cell service.
In Africa, cycled through 10 countries and ended up getting 10 SIM cards. Procedures are different everywhere but was able to sort through the right bureaucracy. In general, I avoid remote roaming as well as most calling in favor of local SIM cards and quick text messages, so it doesn't really serve that "emergency" type need - but still a useful communications tool even when you don't (yet) know anyone in the country.
As an aside, in Australia, it was a while ago - so there it was those orange Telstra pay phones and PocketMail device that worked surprisingly well...not emergency communications but a low cost, quick "I'm here" communication.