5 Tips For Traveling With A Wheelchair

If you're living life with a wheelchair, you already know how complicated routine errands and events can be without the ability to walk. This doesn't, however, make you disinterested in travel, right? Traveling with a wheelchair is no doubt more complicated than most would suspect, but it's certainly not an impossibility. You just have to know HOW to travel. If you're gearing up to travel with a wheelchair any time soon, check out the tips below; they just may help you through. 1. Meet with your doctor first. Discuss your travel plans in detail and find out what risks you face and what you should and shouldn't do. 2. Pack lightly. The last thing you'll need are tons of extra bags to lug around. 3. Call ahead. Make sure every place you plan on seeing, from the hotel to the museum, has wheelchair access. Call instead of looking online. You can never be too sure about whether internet information has been recently updated or not. 4. Always allow for extra time. You never really know when you'll need extra time when traveling from point A to point B. Because of this, you should always allow for a bit of extra time when you're traveling. 5. Be willing and able to tip those who assist you. It'll make you feel good about being helped and it'll make others more happy to help you; making the entire trip smoother.

Comments

[FilmingInArgentina]

My grandmother (at 92) came to visit me and while she could walk a few steps, really needed to be in a wheelchair and didn´t want to. Even if you don´t need one in regular life (she lives independently) sometimes it might be a good idea, especially when traveling to "walking" cities, like Buenos Aires, where I live.

[Alan Gregory]

We just celebrated the fifth anniversary of my wife's double lung transplant. I remember visiting Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge in southeastern Virginia with her just after my retirement from the Air Force. She was still wheelchair-bound at the time and I pushed her chair 4.5 miles from the trailhead out to Lake Drummond. It was quite a chore, but worth it, of course. You're absolutely right.