So far, we've written a lot about or leisure activities, but this post is going to explain how we are working remotely while traveling through Europe. Due to the time difference, we do most of our leisure activities in the morning and early afternoon. We work from about 3pm to 11pm local time, which was 9-5 Eastern Time.
Our cellular service provider is T-Mobile and they offer free data, texting, wifi calling, and $0.20/min calls on over cell network. I make a lot of calls for work, so I knew I needed to have a wifi connection for the free calls.
When we booked our Airbnb places, we always made sure they have wifi and a desk or a table to work from.
So, as you can imagine, this can be challenging in some areas. We faced our first challenge when we got to the Airbnb in Madrid. We discovered that the wifi at the Airbnb was not fast enough to handle wifi calling AT ALL. So, the first day there was very frustrating as I had to deal with many dropped calls. I knew I needed another solution and fast. After a lot of research, I ended up renting a 4g wireless card for $40 for a 5-day rental. The card was great. I was able to connect to wifi from anywhere and the 4g card provided enough speed to be able to make and receive wifi calls from anywhere.
The other benefit of this solution was that I could work from anywhere and I wasn't locked down to working from a hot stuffy Airbnb room. The next day, I worked from a park in Madrid. Check our post "Madrid for 3 days" for details :)
So the solution was great but only short-term. This was going to be very expensive if I was going to rent the card for the remaining 60 days. So, after a ton more research, we decided to return the card in Barcelona after the first 5 days and we purchased a pre-paid 4G sim card from Orange. This prepaid card provided 9GB of 4G data for only $18. Getting the SIM card in Spain was much cheaper than getting it in France or Italy, plus it allowed for free high-speed data roaming in most EU countries.
The 9GB was enough for about 3 weeks of use and we could recharge the card online. We put the SIM card in Lily's phone and we used her phone's hotspot feature so that I could be connected to "wifi" in order to make and receive free calls. This served its purpose. The only issue was that Lily couldn't use here US number at all.
If we do travel for a long period again, I'll be sure to bring a wifi card from the US and put a prepaid SIM card in there.
Aside from connectivity, there were some other essential pieces of equipment we brought for work. One is a Bluetooth headset with excellent noise canceling. The one I have is called "BlueParrott Noise Canceling Bluetooth Headset" and allows me to have a conversation from a busy cafe or street with almost no background noise for the listener.
Other work equipment included: laptops, power strip, power converter and external battery for phones.
As you can see, the connectivity aspect of working remote took a little while to figure out and perfect, but what I would say it is the most difficult part about working while traveling through Europe is the discipline it requires.
It can be difficult to stay focused when you've just arrived in a new beautiful area and you're anxious to go exploring. If you know me, you know I'm pretty disciplined when it comes to work and I can usually stay focused under most circumstances, but there have been times when it was very difficult.
I can say that so far, I've been able to stay focused enough to get done what was needed every day, but I don't think I was as productive as I could have been if I was working from my home office (the dining room table).
That's it for now. Sorry for the delay on posting, we will start our Italy blogs soon. SO much to cover!!!!
Thanks for reading.
H & L
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