Verizon is really thin on the ground out West, their coverage just keeps shrinking as their LTEiRA partners shut down or get bought out by T-Mobile and AT&T.

Between Reno and Las Vegas it's pretty stark, huge holes in Verizon's coverage and a few 3G CDMA only towers, while AT&T has strong band 14 coverage, and T-Mobile has slightly better coverage than Verizon but also lets you roam onto AT&T.

Meanwhile in the San Juans the situation is dire on Verizon, with only one tower just on Orcas Island. AT&T has a handful of towerd, two on Orcas and then they force roam everyone onto T-Mobile who has dozens of local towers.

So long as you are on AT&T or T-Mobile with roaming you'll have the best coverage possible, but if your stuck on Verizon it seems your in for a rough ride these days.

I have a dual-SIM phone, maybe $250 at Best Buy.

Primary Mint SIM, secondary MobileX (Verizon) SIM.

Monthly cost $35.