Shore Leave Tech Checklist: 12 Things Before You Go

Updated 26 August 2026 · shore-leave, port-calls, connectivity, crew-life

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A working shore leave tech checklist comes down to twelve checks you run before the gangway, and most of them take under two minutes each. Charge your phone to full and carry a power bank. Activate data before you leave ship WiFi. Download offline maps and your terminal location. Photograph your seaman's book and passport page. Save the agent's number and the last-boat time as an alarm. Everything else in this article is the detail behind those twelve.

I have watched a second engineer miss a bus back to a terminal in Rotterdam because his phone died at 40 percent in the cold and he had no offline map, no cash and no agent number written anywhere except in a chat app he could not open. Four hours of shore leave turned into a very expensive taxi and an uncomfortable conversation with the master. None of that needed to happen.

The 12-point checklist in short

Run this in the cabin, not on the gangway. The whole thing takes about fifteen minutes the first time and five minutes after that.

The rest of this article explains the ones that are more than a tick box.

Power comes first, because everything else needs it

Your phone is the single point of failure for the whole shore leave, so treat battery as the first item. A modern phone with data roaming on, screen bright in sunlight and maps running will drain in three to four hours of real use. Add cold weather and lithium cells lose a chunk of usable capacity below about five degrees Celsius. That 60 percent you left the ship with can read 15 percent by the time you want a taxi.

The fix is boring and it works. Charge the phone to full before you leave, carry a power bank of at least 10,000 mAh, and carry the cable that actually charges your phone fast rather than the free one from a hotel. A 10,000 mAh bank gives most phones two full charges, which covers any realistic day ashore. If you want the reasoning on capacity, airline limits and which units survive a contract, we went through it in detail in the tested power bank picks for seafarers.

Keep the power bank in an inside pocket in cold ports. Same physics as the phone, a cold bank delivers less.

One small habit that saves the day

Switch the phone to low power mode as you step off the gangway, before you need it. It costs you nothing on a day when you are mostly walking and messaging, and it typically buys two extra hours. Turn it off if you need the camera properly.

Get your data working before you lose ship WiFi

Activate and test any eSIM or travel plan while you are still on ship WiFi, because most eSIM activations need an internet connection to install the profile. This is the single most common mistake I see. Crew buy a plan in the terminal car park, then discover the QR code needs data to download the profile, and there is no free WiFi anywhere.

The sequence that works:

1. Install the eSIM profile in the cabin on ship WiFi, a day before arrival if the plan allows it.
2. Switch the line on when you are within coverage, usually as the ship comes alongside.
3. Send one test message over mobile data with WiFi turned off, so you know it genuinely works.
4. Check which line is set as default for data, because phones love to default back to your home SIM and start roaming at home rates.

Step four is where the money goes. A home SIM roaming in Europe or Asia can burn through a lot in a few hours if maps and photo backup are running. Turn data roaming off on the home line and leave only the travel line active.

Which plan to buy depends heavily on your route and how many countries a rotation touches. Our side-by-side test of the two most common crew options is in Airalo versus Holafly for port calls, and the broader comparison of what actually holds up between calls is in the best eSIM options for seafarers. Airalo is the one I install first, since it covers the largest country list. As of August 2026 the regional packages that suit most rotations sit in the rough range of 5 to 20 US dollars per week of light use, but check the current pricing page before you buy because these change often.

If your phone is not eSIM capable, a local physical SIM from a terminal kiosk is still fine. Budget twenty minutes and bring your passport, because most countries now require ID registration.

Offline maps are the item people regret skipping

Download the offline map for the entire port region, not the city centre, because container and bulk terminals frequently sit ten to thirty kilometres outside the mapped urban area. Google Maps offline areas cover a rectangle you draw yourself, so drag it wide enough to include the terminal, the road back and the town.

Two things to do beyond the download itself:

• Pin the exact gate you use. Not the port authority address, the gate your shuttle drops you at. Drop a pin, name it "GATE, ship", and it survives with no signal.
• Screenshot the route back. A screenshot works when everything else fails, including a dead data plan or an app update that decides to log you out.

Offline maps also handle the situation where you have signal but no useful bandwidth. Port areas are notorious for one bar of overloaded coverage. The full breakdown of which apps hold up with no connection, including transit and translation, is in our tested offline maps for shore leave.

Save the terminal name in the local language too. A taxi driver in Yokohama or Busan will recognise the local script far faster than an English transliteration, and having it as a screenshot means you can simply show the phone.

Documents: what to photograph and where to keep it

Photograph your passport photo page, your seaman's book, your visa or shore pass and your vaccination card, then store the images somewhere that opens without internet. Your phone's local photo album counts. A cloud folder set to "available offline" counts. A link to a cloud folder does not count.

Why this matters ashore. Gate security sometimes wants to see the document you left in the ship's safe. Hotels and clinics ask for passport details. If you lose the physical document, having a clear photo turns a two-day consular problem into a shorter one. Police in several countries will accept a photo plus your shore pass for a routine street check.

Keep the images in a folder that is not your main camera roll, so you are not scrolling past a hundred engine room photos while someone in uniform waits.

Money: cards, cash and the thing that fails at 22:00

Carry one card that reliably works abroad plus a small amount of local cash, because terminal shuttles, port buses and small shops in many countries still refuse cards. The amount does not need to be large. The equivalent of thirty to fifty US dollars covers a taxi back and food.

Three practical points:

• Tell your bank you are travelling, or use a card built for it. A card that blocks on a foreign transaction at 22:00 in an unfamiliar country is a bad evening.
• Check ATM fees before you withdraw. Terminal and airport ATMs are consistently the worst rate you will find that day.
• Carry a backup card in a different pocket. Separate from the first one, so one lost wallet is not the whole problem.

Which card actually costs less over a contract depends on where you spend and how you convert. We compared the two most common crew choices in Wise versus Revolut for seafarers, including the fee behaviour people usually discover after the fact.

The 2FA trap

Confirm before you sail that you can log into your bank without receiving an SMS to your home number, because that is the failure that strands people. Six months on a contract with the home SIM sitting in a drawer means the code goes to a phone that is switched off in another country.

Move critical accounts to an authenticator app while you still have your home number working. Bank, email, the account that holds your certificates, the app you use to send money home. Save the backup codes somewhere offline. The full method, including what to do when the bank refuses to accept anything but SMS, is in our guide on keeping your number and 2FA codes working through a long contract.

Test it before you leave. Log out and log back in. An untested backup is a guess.

Timing and the last boat

Set two alarms for the return, one at your intended departure from town and one thirty minutes before the last boat or gangway deadline. One alarm gets snoozed by someone in a good restaurant.

Add a note in the alarm label with the actual deadline time, because a labelled alarm reading "LAST BOAT 23:00, leave now" cuts through a conversation better than a generic buzz. Write the agent's number and the duty officer's number down on paper as well. Paper works at zero percent battery.

Check the return arrangement before you go rather than assuming. Launch service, shuttle bus and gate opening hours all change between calls, and the terminal gate that was open until midnight last rotation may close at 20:00 now. If you are joining or leaving the ship rather than taking normal shore leave, the transfer side of this is covered in airport to ship transfer options for crew.

What this checklist will not fix

Being honest about the limits matters more than a longer list.

It does not help if the port has no shore leave. Plenty of terminals still restrict access, and some countries require a visa you do not have. No amount of preparation changes an ISPS gate decision or an immigration officer's mood.

It does not solve bad coverage inside a terminal. Steel, containers and distance from town mean patchy signal is normal. Offline preparation is a workaround for this, and it does not make the signal appear.

It does not protect against theft. A phone full of preparation is still a phone in a pocket. Carry the backup card separately, keep the paper number, and accept that a stolen phone ends the digital half of your day regardless.

It does not replace the ship's official channels. Your agent and duty officer are the real safety net. The checklist exists so you can reach them, not so you can skip them.

It adds friction. Fifteen minutes of preparation for four hours ashore feels disproportionate the first time. It stops feeling that way the first time it saves you.

Who does not need most of this

If you are sailing on a route with reliable crew internet and doing short walks near a passenger terminal in a country whose language you speak, most of this is overkill. Charge your phone, take a card, note the return time, go.

The checklist earns its keep in three situations. First, unfamiliar ports where you have never been ashore. Second, ports far from town where getting back means a specific bus or launch. Third, any call in a country where you do not read the alphabet. Anything in those categories, run the full list.

Cruise crew have a different problem set, mostly around bandwidth and account access rather than transport, and the connectivity side of that is covered in our VPN guide for cruise ship crew.

The five-minute version

Not everyone gets fifteen minutes. If the call is short and you are already halfway down the alleyway, do these five in order and accept the risk on the rest.

1. Charge to full and grab the power bank. Everything else depends on this.
2. Turn on the travel data line and send one test message. Confirms it works while you can still fix it.
3. Screenshot the route back and the terminal name. Survives a dead app and a dead network.
4. Save the agent's number to contacts and write it on paper. Two failure modes covered.
5. Set the return alarm with the deadline in the label. The one that gets you back onboard.

That is the compressed version, and it covers roughly eighty percent of what actually goes wrong.

FAQ

Do I need an eSIM for every port call?

No, and buying one for a six hour call is usually a waste. For calls where you will be ashore several hours in a country you visit regularly, a regional eSIM package pays for itself against roaming charges. For a quick walk to a chandler near the gate, ship WiFi plus offline maps is enough. The judgement is whether you need working data away from the terminal.

What happens if my phone dies while I am ashore?

This is why the paper backup exists. Write the agent's number, the duty officer's number and the terminal name on a piece of paper in your wallet before you leave. Any shop, hotel or taxi office can let you make one call. Without the paper you are relying on strangers with translation apps, which works but costs you an hour you may not have.

Should I use ship WiFi or mobile data in port?

Use ship WiFi for anything large before you go ashore, then mobile data once you leave. Ship connections are shared across the whole crew and slow down badly in the evening, so download your maps and updates earlier in the day. If crew WiFi is the bottleneck rather than the plan, the fixes in our guide on making slow crew WiFi usable apply directly.

How much local cash should I carry ashore?

The equivalent of thirty to fifty US dollars in local currency covers a taxi back to the terminal and a meal in most ports. More than that and you are carrying risk for no reason. Get it from a bank ATM in town rather than the terminal, and keep the taxi money separate from the spending money so you cannot accidentally spend the ride home.

Is it safe to photograph my passport and keep it on my phone?

It is a reasonable trade-off for most crew. The risk is a stolen phone, and you reduce that with a screen lock and a separate folder rather than the open camera roll. The benefit is real: replacing a lost passport abroad is significantly faster when you can show the consulate a clear photo of the original. Use a locked notes app or an encrypted folder if your phone offers one.

Does any of this work in ports with no signal at all?

Yes, and that is the point of the offline half of the list. Downloaded maps, screenshots, saved contacts, a translation language pack and photographed documents all function with the phone in airplane mode. The parts that need a network are data, banking and messaging, so plan the return trip assuming they might not work.

Verdict

Preparation ashore is unglamorous and it is the difference between a good afternoon and an expensive scramble. The twelve points above cost you fifteen minutes in the cabin and they cover the failures that actually happen: a dead battery, an unactivated data plan, a terminal that is not where the map thinks it is, and a bank that wants an SMS code sent to a phone in another hemisphere. Run the full list for unfamiliar ports, run the five-minute version when time is short, and keep the paper backup in your wallet regardless of how good your shore leave tech checklist gets.

Related reading

• Best offline maps for shore leave: tested picks
• Best eSIM for seafarers: what actually works between port calls
• Best power bank for seafarers, tested at sea

About the author

I work as a marine engineer and have spent most of the last decade on bulk carriers and product tankers, which means a lot of terminals a long way from anywhere useful. This checklist grew out of my own mistakes and the ones I watched colleagues make: the dead phone in a Rotterdam winter, the eSIM that would not activate in a car park, the bank that locked a card the first time it saw a foreign transaction. Everything here is tested by the only method that counts, which is needing it and not having it. Nothing in this article is sponsored; the Airalo link above is an affiliate link, and no other product is linked for commission.

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