pinniped

Will the debit card function as an ATM card as well? (Mine does with almost universal acceptance.) With that, I could probably complete a Europe trip without using a credit card. Might go over with a little seed cash - just in case there's a queue for the ATM in the airport and I want to just grab a taxi or train and get to the city.

I always make sure I have some money in both my checking and shares accounts - I occasionally run into a foreign ATM that does not give an option of selecting which account to withdraw from. And yes, I ran into one in Italy that would only pull from my shares account, the opposite of what the default typically is.

That said, I'd still look into the secured CC option. Get it on the opposite network from whatever your debit card is: that way you have one Visa and one Mastercard. I've been in countries where my MCs were randomly rejecting and my Visas were going through, or vice versa. (Usually because of in-country issues, as my banks in the US did not show any rejections.)