Aussies how do you reduce your call costs while in the USA

I will be travelling to the West Coast of the US next month, I hope not to have make phone calls while on our cruise, but does anybody have hints and tips about reducing the costs of call back to Australia when we hit port my provider is Vodafone:confused:

Shazza - if you are taking your laptop - skype is the way to go - on our last (land) trip to the US I tried all sorts of things but this ended up being way cheaper..........

Jane

Shazza - if you are taking your laptop - skype is the way to go - on our last (land) trip to the US I tried all sorts of things but this ended up being way cheaper..........

 

Jane

This where I get confused, can only talk skype to skype, eg my mother does not have a computer so can I call her landline or mobile using skype, sorry to sound so dumb:o

No not at all I know I was really perplexed - will have a look at my laptop later and also clarify with my sister but there is 2 ways of using skype - the first is just using your computer and dialling someone who also has skype and the second is using it as a phone - I spent a fortune on US prepaid cards (ran out of credit before I could get through!!!!!!! not happy) you can purchase credit - I think I purchased $20 of credit (which a lot of has just expired) and you can then dial from your computer to any number - landline or mobile and it really is sooooo cheap - the quality isn't quite as good and you have to use your computer as the mouthpiece/ear piece so if you are in a noisy background it is hard to hear and everyone can hear your conversation but is definitely the way I would go in future - sing out if I can help anymore....... it is confusing at first if you haven't used skype (like me!!) but really easy once you look at it and so worth it!! :)

We have been in Hawaii for the last few weeks and following a lot of research before we went, we settled on buying a prepaid mobile when we arrived in Honolulu.

We only wanted to be able to be contacted if needed, make local calls and contact home if needed. The phone and enough credit for us for the 3 weeks was only $42.00.

We both have iphones in Aus, but getting sim cards on a US network seemed like a major hassle from all that we read before going.

We were very cautious about using our iphones as we were hit with a huge bill last year after using them in New Zealand.