[nanfromsactown]

Originally Posted by Jstuckey

Congrats on your solid plan! A couple of my thoughts:
Yes, ATT was a pain. We spent the first three days trying to get things to work right, after we had purchased the global (24.99) package. Might be a good idea to just buy a temp use phone as suggested.
I flew home in regular seats, but I was 3 weeks post op when I did. I think that may have helped. Had a hybrid lumbar fusion and 1 ADR, so pretty remarkable that I was fine without the recline seats. I wouldn't have benefitted from them. No problem sitting as long as I got up (day time flight helped to).
I changed my credit card to a no fee for foreign transactions type(Chase). They just use the day's exchange rate. That is how I paid for surgery too. And yes, do tell them the dates you'll be gone and where you'll be.
We only had a little bit of cash, and used our card otherwise. Since we didn't carry a lot of cash, we didn't worry too much about where to exchange it for the best rate. I think we did it at the airport right away.
Take it easy if they offer hydrotherapy. That is the one thing I would change about my experience if I could. It felt easy and comfortable and wonderful at the time.... I suffered greatly from overdoing it all three sessions about 4 hours later. I had to quit doing it until restarting it today at home (4 weeks post op). I think I can tolerate it now.
Prunes, prunes, and more prunes!

Thanks for the info. I'm looking into the cell phones. I'll be taking my iPad and leaving the laptop home, much less weight to carry! Will also have my smart phone with me to receive texts which is what we did last time we were in Europe. AT&T allows you to receive texts for free, so I would turn it on once a day to see if there was any news from home. It worked out well.

I don't think I've ever actually exchanged money here before going overseas. Always just took some cash and my debit card and advised the bank. In case anyone ever goes to Russia for a vacation, they are very particular. If you want to exchange cash for rubles, your cash has to be in pristine condition and nothing bigger than a 20. The better thing there is to take rubles out of an ATM machine or just pay for things with a credit or debit card.