Vacations Blog

From guest blogger Glenda Watson Hyatt, The Left Thumb Blogger

With both my husband and I having significant physical disabilities and relying on electric wheelchairs for mobility, traveling can be challenging but, with some planning and research, definitely possible. Most recently, we have enjoyed cruising from Vancouver to Los Angeles, playing at Disneyland, and spending four nights in Las Vegas. I have also done some traveling within British Columbia. All with only minor glitches and some important lessons learned.

Hotels

When traveling in North America, keep in mind that Canada and Mexico do not have legislation similar to the American with Disabilities Act, which specifies requirements for physical access. However, this does not mean these two countries are not accessible; quite the contrary. But, it does mean not all hotels and resort destinations will meet your accessibility needs.

• When booking hotel rooms, keep in mind that “accessible” (or “ADA compliant” in the United States”) means different things to different people.

A couple of years ago, I traveled overnight to Victoria for a board meeting. The organizer booked an accessible motel room for me. If accessible room meant only a wide door, then, yes, the room was accessible. If an accessible room meant being able to park my scooter beside the bed or to get into the bathroom to even get close to the tub, the room was not accessible. The room was doable for one night. Had I wanted to take a shower or bath, the room was definitely not accessible.

Be specific about your needs. Do you need a roll-in shower? A bath bench? A flashing fire alarm?

Candy Harrington, editor of accessible travel magazine Emerging Horizons and author of 101 Accessible Vacations: Travel Ideas for Wheelers and Slow Walkers, recommends asking, “Can you block that accessible room for me?” In hotel terminology, “block” means to reserve a specific room for a specific guest. Asking the clerk to “guarantee the room” is the wrong terminology as that means “to secure with a credit card’. Harrington says if the clerk is unwilling or unable to block a room, then make your reservation elsewhere. If you can’t be sure that accessible room will be available when you arrive, then what good is your reservation.

• If there is a problem with your room upon arrival, politely bring it to the staff’s attention.Frequent business traveler Eric Lipp, Director of Chicago-based non-profit Open Doors Organization that teaches businesses how to succeed in the disability market, advises people with disabilities to speak up when they encounter an obstacle at a hotel. Ask to see the General Manager or the Manager on Duty and calmly explain your problem. Tipp who uses a scooter for mobility points out, “…you are probably the first person to bring it up. A hostile stand off doesn’t work. My experience has been that most managers are willing to come to a reasonable solution.”

• If you use an electric wheelchair or scooter, pack a power extension cord. There may not be an electrical outlet where you need to charge.

Cruises

Cruises are a great way to travel, particularly for those with mobility impairments, because everything is right there: accommodation, dining, recreation facilities and entertainment. The newer ships are quite accessible. However, the main issue is the number of accessible cabins and which passengers get them.

According to Lisa Burbank, contributing editor for National Geographic Traveler, “Cruise-line policies vary on booking such rooms in advance. The policy often depends on how quickly a ship is filling up.”

• Complete documentation. Cruise lines typically require a medical form, which will indicate an accessible cabin is necessary, so assignments shouldn’t be arbitrarily switched.

The special-needs department can also help with requirements such as flashing fire alarms for guests who are hearing impaired or Deaf and special menus for cruisers with severe allergies.

• Have your travel agent flag your reservation with a note “do not upgrade” in your record so you will not be bumped up to a non-accessible space. If you’re traveling with a group, Burbank suggests linking reservations together so one person’s cabin or dining assignment will not be changed.

I wish we had known this before our first cruise. During the registration on the day we left, we were told we had been upgraded at no additional cost. We boarded and eventually found our cabin. My husband unlocked the door and realized his power chair would not fit through the doorway. No way, no how. Things didn’t look promising when we could not even get into our cabin.

We found our way to the Purser’s Desk, where we were told the ship was fully booked and, thus, we couldn’t simply change cabins. Once they realized we were unable to park our chairs in the hallway and walk into our cabin, they told us to go have lunch while they tried locating the passengers in our original cabin to see if they could switch to a non-accessible room.

Dishearteningly we ate our first meal onboard, thinking that may be a mighty expensive lunch if we needed to disembark before the ship sailed. Eventually, we were reassigned to our cabin, which turned out to be ultra accessible. It was smooth sailing from there – until the seasickness struck.

Do you have any accessible tips to share? Please pass them on!

Additional Resources:

Disability Travel: Part I: Plan Accessible Trips
Disability Travel: Part II: Getting to the Destination
Disability Travel: Part III: At the Destination

From guest blogger, Craig Grimes, of AccessibleBarcelona.

Getting To the Destination

The biggest fear that most disabled people have is not actually being in a strange new place, but getting to it. Although flying is slowly becoming more accessible, many disabled people are still dubious about the quality of service they will receive, especially in a foreign country.

In general, airlines have very similar policies with regards to disabled clients, but it is always a good idea to check individual company’s policies. Check with disability forums about other people’s experiences and see if they recommend any particular airlines. Unfortunately, it is not a case of the biggest companies have the best service for disabled travelers, I have had both good and bad experiences with various major airlines. One way of checking reviews of airlines is through web sites such as Skytrax. Although it doesn’t give specific information for disabled travelers you can get an idea about different airlines.

Online Booking Engines

Probably the cheapest way to fly internationally is through reserving tickets with a large online booking engine such as LastMinute or Kayak. LastMinute now allow disabled travelers to request online airport assistance, in order to get a list of the departure airports from your country you have to scroll to the bottom of the home page screen and click on your national flag. Kayak is slightly different in that when you want to make the booking you are transferred to the airline’s web site. Therefore, it depends on the individual airline’s terms and conditions to how you proceed with letting them know that you are a disabled traveler.

Accommodation

There are many types of accommodation available from private apartments and villas to hostels and hotels. There are also different ways of making reservations; through a travel agent, directly with the establishment or through online booking engines. All of the above want to sell you their services whether or not it is suitable for your needs, it is very important that you state exactly what you require even quoting measurements of your wheelchair if necessary.

Finding Suitable Accommodation

Mainstream Online Booking Engines

One method is through the use of online booking engines, however, caution should be taken when using them as they do not provide specific information about the access of the hotel. Other problems with online booking engines are that they do not provide the contact details of the establishment until after the reservation has been made and it is rarely possible to request and adapted room. This means that it is impossible to confirm its suitability and what facilities are available until after the reservation has been made. Even when a suitable hotel can be found, it is then not possible to reserve a specific adapted room, therefore, the hotel has to be contacted after the reservation has been made to check availability of and allocate the adapted room.

However, online booking engines are a good source of information to discover the names of potentially suitable hotels. Once the names of a few hotels have been ascertained a search engine may be used to find the direct contact details of the hotel.

High Street Travel Agents Vs Specialized Travel Agents

General high street travel agents are renowned for getting the access requirements of disabled travelers totally wrong. I have been contacted through my company AccessibleBarcelona on several occasions by disabled people that have arrived in Barcelona to find that the hotel that they booked through their travel agent is not accessible. Although they are slowly getting better it may well be worth going to a specialized travel agent that has a lot of experience of organizing trips for disabled people. The drawback of specialized travel agents? The cost, as with any travel agent their commissions can be extremely high at 20 or 30% of the total package.

Other Methods of Booking Hotels and Services

Some disabled people have become so fed up with the lack of understanding of their needs within the travel industry, that they themselves have begun writing their own online travel guides or setting up services where they live. The companies they establish are not travel agents as such, but more independent businesses that arrange services such as accessible hotel reservations, airport transfers, equipment hire and tours for disabled travelers.

Using search engines, disability forums and blogs is a good way to find these web sites. In order to get the best results from search engines the correct keywords need to be used such as disabled, access, accessible, hotels, accommodation along with the name of your destination.

Next up, Part III: At the Destination

Share your destination experiences with us, good or bad, we are interested in hearing about your trips!