Thread by @heydave7

So this is how I get internet at national parks.

👇🏻

I prefer using cell data but in national parks cell data is very poor. Sometimes I might get limited cell data late at night or early in the morning, and completely no cell data the rest of the time.

For cell data, I have 5 options I carry. I have two Verizon hotspots (both unlimited data) and I have two AT&T hotspots (100gb and 25gb plans). This is in addition to my and my wife’s two Verizon iPhones.

I also have a WeBoost cell booster with antenna mounted to top of RV.

The WeBoost helps when I’m near cell towers but again in most of my stays, cell data has been limited.

So my main internet is coming from a portable satellite dish I carry. It’s quite big and sits on a a hefty tripod. Takes like 20 minutes to set up hardware.

But the difficult part is trying to point the satellite dish to perfectly align with a satellite. It takes 10 minutes to 1 hour sometimes.

And then I need a direct line of sight to the satellite and if there are trees blocking then I can’t get reception.

So I’ve had campgrounds where there’s no or limited cell data reception and my sat dish is blocked by trees.

So those are the times I vent and wish for Starlink to come sooner than later.

The sat dish I carry connects to HughesNet Gen5 which offers fast speeds... 10+Mbps download speed.

It would be fine if I was stationary. But we’re moving to different campgrounds every few days, so it’s a pain to set up and take down.

And it’s also stressful not knowing if you’re next campground will have trees blocking the view to the satellite.

But in the end it’s still worth it considering I’m camping at some amazing places and my kids are having a blast.