I'd go that route except I'm not around to help him through much of anything. I'm probably going to buy him the Prag's book on learning to program with Minecraft extensions or one of the entry level books geared towards kids.
But it'd still be helpful if he could e-mail me questions, look up things on Stack Overflow or something, and so on.
There are free wifi hotspots he can use with any portable gadget.
He can also make use of library resources for email, searching, etc. It's non-ideal, but it might have some perks; having to chew on a problem for a bit before you can get to a library may help him develop some serious problem solving chops.
But it'd still be helpful if he could e-mail me questions, look up things on Stack Overflow or something, and so on.