A Week in Orlando: Part 1 Airports


As a disabled traveler, what have I learned about flight travel?

First, research is your friend! It's really important to know both the airport that you are leaving from and the airport you are arriving to. Know the best place to be dropped off at to minimize your steps to security, and the gate. Know what accessibility amenities are available to you. For example, most airlines will have a service where they have someone push you to your gate in a wheelchair, yours or theirs. If you can walk, but have trouble with distances, this can be a game changer as far as airport travel goes. You do have to allow for extra time because you will often have a wait for this service as many people use it. Figure out what you're planning to do while at the airport and know where to go for those things. For example, I usually use the restroom, fill up my water bottle, and grab a cup of coffee before heading to the gate. If I'm going to be on a longer flight, I also pick up some food to take with me since they don't serve that on the plane anymore. My challenges come in when I don't know where the water bottle filling station is or where the nearest Starbucks to my gate is. This can cause me to have to walk back and forth the length of the terminal and use up precious energy.

When considering the airport you are arriving to, you should look up the gate you will be arriving at as well as the baggage claim carousel your luggage will go to if you are checking a bag. Find out where you have to go for transportation. Are you using an airport shuttle? A ride share? A rental car? These meeting points can easily be a 20 to 30 minute walk apart from each other, so it pays to know where you are supposed to go so you don't end up at the wrong place and have to walk forever to get to the right one. I know, because this is what happened to me on Sunday! If your airline ticket does not show the arrival gate or the baggage claim, you can go to your favorite internet search engine, mine is Bing, and look up the airport you will be arriving to. They should have an option for flight status and you can input your flight to receive the arrival gate and baggage claim information. They will also have a terminal map to help you find your way around.

When it comes to mobility devices, airlines are notorious for damaging them! I would never bring a custom-made or very expensive mobility device on an aircraft. For myself, I am purchasing an inexpensive power chair to use specifically for travel. That way if it gets destroyed, I'm not as heartbroken. Another option is to take advantage of the wheelchair service available in the airport and rent a chair for use at your destination. When I took this trip, I spent quite a bit of time on the Facebook groups for Disney world with disabilities. I found many recommendations on there for mobility aid rental providers, and chose the one that worked best for me. They delivered a power chair to my hotel and then picked it up there at the end of my stay.

So what do I pack in my flight bag? This is the bag that I will keep with me at my seat while on the plane. It must be small enough to fit under the seat in front of me. I have a special bag with four wheels so I don't have to carry it, because my back will not allow me to carry a bag over one or both shoulders. However, I have found that this bag does not fit under the aisle seat on a 737, so if I am assigned one of these seats I keep a special, smaller bag inside of it that I can toss into whatever things I will need for my flight and then the personal bag goes into the overhead bin. Here's a list of things that I like to have available while I'm on the aircraft:
Charging cord for my phone
My phone
A book or Kindle
Earbuds
Tissues
Lip balm
Cough drops
A credit card for onboard purchases
A filled water bottle
Snacks

I hope you found these tips helpful! Feel free to comment below with any questions you might have about air travel.

Here's the thing: Air travel can be intimidating these days between security checkpoints, all the procedures, not to mention the thought of hopping into a metal tube and flying through the air! It helps to minimize the unknown by doing your research ahead of time. At least that's what helps me!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

At least it's not bad news

Image
  Radical tumor removal is not always possible because of the critical brainstem or diencephalic locations of some tumors. Tumor progression and eventual death are likely in such patients. Stereotactic radiosurgery for pilocytic astrocytomas part 1: outcomes in adult patients Kano et. al.  So my posts are usually preceded by a scripture verse, often an encouraging one. Today I needed to give you an insight into what I've been experiencing. From the time I was diagnosed with a brain tumor, about a year and a half ago, I was reassured that it was a "WHO grade 1 benign" tumor. I, mistakenly, took this to mean that it wasn't a big deal. Even when I was told in June that it had grown "slightly," I thought that meant they'd zap it with radiation and that'd be the end of it. Guess what, I was wrong. When my June MRI revealed growth, I was referred to the Tumor Center for treatment. Fearing a long, drawn-out process, I was relieved when they scheduled all my...
Read more

The Next Crazy Thing

Image
Buckle in! This is a processing post so it is likely to be long and wordy and emotional and probably flawed in many ways. I thank you for your patience and anyone who makes it to the end gets bonus points in my book 😏.  Let's start with the info. I've been having progressively more intense, more frequent, and longer lasting migraines. Since my eye surgery in May, I've also been experiencing a great deal of nausea, almost daily. Sometimes meds help (with either), sometimes they don't. In addition, since the eye surgery, my double vision has intensified. My depth perception is shot, I'm regularly missing things I grab for, mistaking curbs for cracks in the sidewalk, bumping into walls or counters. Those are the three things that neurosurgery told us to watch for with regards to the shunt functioning properly: headaches, nausea, and vision changes. Now the vision changes were probably because of the surgery and the nausea was probably  because of the migraines, but th...
Read more

When "Wait and See" Wouldn't Sound so Bad

Image
    Ten days after I received the call letting me know that they found something on the MRI I was sitting in the office of a Neurosurgeon.  I have no doubt that God orchestrated the circumstances that had brought me there, including a friend who is also dealing with a brain tumor recommending this clinic. But how could any of this be real? Only a couple of people knew what was going on, but there wasn't much to know before this appointment. All we had were a few key phrases on the MRI Study Result and our dear friend, Dr. Google.  I went into the appointment with the impression that the doctor would either recommend watching and waiting, doing another MRI in six months and seeing if anything changed, or taking it out right away.  In previous encounters where the option was to wait or do something I have vastly preferred doing something, but this time it was different. I had read about the potential complications of surgery and I was scared.  Not to men...
Read more