"Rusty" blank wrote in message
. ..
I think it's time to get an Iridium satellite phone. We're gong to have way
too much time away from cell sites.

Any suggestions as to a cruiser-friendly source of hardware and airtime?

I got my Iridium phone and antenna from Outfitter Satellite:
http://www.outfittersatellite.com/

I also get my pre-paid minutes from them, and have been able to purchase
additional air-time from them while at sea. Probably most other resellers
can do the same, but Outfitter has been easy to deal with for me.

For data services over the satphone, I use XGate from Global Marine
Networks: http://www.globalmarinenet.net/ . Again, there are others, but
this has worked well for me.

Just a customer,
Paul, S/V VALIS