Oct
29
2008
After dinner on Saturday, the newlyweds had a surprise for all the guests. They’d hired a boat to sail the canals of Amsterdam for a while, something I’d often wanted to do, but never had the time for. The landing stage and boat were inaccessible to wheelchairs, but, as I mentioned yesterday, I wasn’t missing out on a minute of Jonathan and Stan’s big day. We just had to work out how to get around the car that had been inconsiderately parked at the top of the steps down to the landing stage, down those narrow steps, and then onto the boat. The car was the biggest obstacle, as it didn’t leave us a lot of room to squeeze past, and one of the more nervous guests was sure I was going to end up in the canal at one point.
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Oct
28
2008
The second day in Amsterdam was the day of Jonathan and Stan’s wedding reception. The heavy rain of Friday had given way to a beautiful cool but sunny Saturday, and the weather held for the whole day. The company was great, the beer, wine and food were excellent, and everyone had a great time. Traveling with a wheelchair, especially to a city like Amsterdam, takes planning and effort, and if I ever had any doubts whether it was worthwhile, days like this would dispell them. Being able to be there and be part of such an important event for two dear friends meant so much, and letting the wheelchair stand in the way of that would just be wrong. With effort and the help of the good people who were at the event, I made it to all the parts of the reception, and no barrier stood in the way of us having a first-class time.
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Oct
24
2008
When I was a kid, I loved anything to do with animals: the nature documentaries on the BBC; the Life on Earth book my brother got one Christmas; the rock pools on the shoreline in County Mayo; the zoo in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. I never lost that fascination, but I did go through a period where I wouldn’t go to the zoo anymore. I still wanted to watch the animals, but it wasn’t politically correct to like zoos, and I felt guilty about even wanting to go. Recently, I’ve come to appreciate zoos again, especially ones which are really making an effort to provide suitable enclosures for the animals that can’t be released into the wild. I can’t claim to have reclaimed the childhood sense of wonder visiting and animal watching, but I’ve enjoyed the visits. However, zoos present certain challenges to wheelchair users, and I strongly advise doing a little research about the zoo you plan to visit beforehand.
A couple of weeks ago, I went to the Gaia Park Kerkrade Zoo in the Netherlands. Getting there without a car would’ve been tricky, but fortunately my good friend Thomas (who took the photo for the new banner you can see) was keen to go and check it out, and he has a car with a big enough trunk for a wheelchair. We didn’t do any research beyond checking the weather (it was lovely) and the opening times, and there were a couple of surprises in store for us.
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Oct
22
2008
Over the summer, I visited my folks in County Wexford, Ireland, and my mother and I decided to go for a day out. Over the years, we’ve seen a lot of what Wexford has to offer, and we wanted to try somewhere new. Both of us have an interest in archaeology and history, so the Irish National Heritage Park in Ferrycarraig sounded like just the thing. It is an open-air museum with reconstructions of stone age, bronze age and Celtic and Viking era homesteads, burial sites and places of ritual; the web site even promises ancient animal breeds. I’d been to an excellent open-air museum in Poland, and was looking forward to a great day out. Unfortunately, I’d reckoned without the possibility of bad design making the park essentially inaccessible.
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Oct
20
2008
If you ever make it to Wroclaw, the administrative capital of Lower Silesia in Poland, make sure you keep an eye out for dwarfs when you’re sight-seeing in the city center. There are currently over 50 small statues of dwarfs scattered around the old town, each engaged in his own hobby, each representing a different aspect of the city or of Polish life and history. It’s quite a feat to find them all, but it can be done, even in a wheelchair. Actually, it may be even easier for a wheelchair user, cobblestoned streets notwithstanding - we’re used to keeping our eyes on the ground looking out for obstacles and other problems, so we’re more likely to spot these little guys. They are worth keeping an eye out, not only for the art and amusement of them, but also for the aspect of Polish history that inspired them.
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Oct
17
2008
Hanover may not be one of Europe’s premiere holiday destinations, but the city has considered how to best present what it can offer visitors. One interesting thing they’ve created is the Red Thread. Starting and finishing at the Tourist Information Office in the plaza in front of the main railway station, you follow a red line painted on the ground, passing most of the places of historical and architectural interest in the city. There’s a map and booklet available, with all the details and stories you could want when visiting a city. It takes between two and three hours in a manual chair, and around two hours in a powerchair. The outdoor part of the trail is wheelchair accessible, although not everything is wheelchair friendly. Some of the buildings along the way don’t have access because to add ramps or lifts would affect their historical integrity, and the old part of the city is cobblestoned, although not in as challenging a way as Cologne or Wroclaw.
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Sep
25
2008
When I first went to London with my wheelchair, I discovered that the Tube was no longer a viable option for me. For a brief time, I thought getting around was going to be very awkward and slow, involving complicated bus routes with several changes of bus, not to mention a little stressful, as I was sure I would have to spend the whole time with my eye on the street signs to make sure I didn’t miss my stop. However, while the buses are slow because of the city’s traffic congestion, the routes were more straightforward than I thought, and the drivers are very good about announcing stops that have been requested. Not only that, all but two of the city’s bus routes are fully accessible, and free of charge to wheelchair users. Even better yet, my friends Tom and Eric found a bus route so perfect for my needs in the city, it was like I’d planned it out myself. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the number 23.
Besides being perfect for my needs, I believe the 23 is a great bus for any tourist who wants to plan a day seeing a good chunk of the city’s tourist attractions. Of course there are many things to see in London that aren’t on this route, but it has enough to plan a great day out around.
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Sep
10
2008
Things to do on a free afternoon in… Kraków, Poland.
Kraków [KRA-koof; Cracow] has such a beautiful city center with so much to explore that it is difficult to imagine having a free afternoon, but take my advice: no matter how short your trip, make sure you take one afternoon away from the castle, the restaurants, the old Jewish quarter and the churches to go out to the Wieliczka Salt Mine [vyeh-LEECH-ka]. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, the mine is so much more than you could imagine from the name ’salt mine’. There are whole rooms with intricate decoration carved into the salt of the mine, which was fully functional until 1996, and now stands open for tourists all year round. Like many such sites that were never designed for wheelchairs, it is not fully accessible, but they have done a good job of adapting it, creating a tour for wheelchair users that takes in much of the beauty of the mine.
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Sep
09
2008
Things to do on a free afternoon in… Cologne, Germany.
If you’re in north-western Germany, in the area called Nordrhein-Westfalen, and you have an afternoon to kill, consider taking a trip to the Cologne Chocolate Museum (Schokolandenmuseum Koeln), a celebration of 3000 years of chocolate. The 15-year old museum is quite accessible, rating a Good. Aiming to enlighten visitors on the history and the production of chocolate, it includes a hothouse with cocoa plants, artifacts from the ancient civilizations that created chocolate, an interactive display of modern and cult chocolate, and even a working production area. It’s not quite Willy Wonka’s Factory, but there’s a lot of fun to be had all the same. I was lucky enough to go with my friend James, a professional chef with friends working in the confectionary industry, which made the trip even more educational, as he had many stories to tell about what we were seeing.
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