Accessibility of excursions transportation

Hi,I will be cruising on Carnival Freedom on 4/28/18 with my quadriplegic son. The ports are Grand Cayman, Montego Bay and Cozumel. I would like to book excursions to an all inclusive beach resort or maybe the Tulum tour. None of these are listed as wheelchair accessible. My question is, is the transportation to and from these excursions wheelchair accessible? Once we are there I am good pushing him around.

Thanks.

Welcome to Cruise Critic. I can only help with two questions. Grand Cayman is a tender port. Not sure if he will be able to get off the ship at this port. Cozumel had a taxi/shuttle stand. (Follow the signs). They have shuttles that are wheel chair accessible. I'm sure other people will chime in with help.

If these are "ship" excursions - meaning you pay the ship, not a private provider - then unless the excursions are noted as being accessible they will not be. Usually the excursions are on large buses and have three to five or six large steps before you get to the seats. I have much better luck using private tour providers. As noted above, Grand Cayman is a tender port. IF the cruise line uses a local tender boat that is accessible there is a chance you will be able to go ashore. However if the ship uses its own life boats to provide the tender service access to these small boats is only possible if you can do three to five steps. The crew are not authorized to lift a person from the tender dock to the boat itself. Regardless of the type of tender used, if the sea is even slightly rough there will be no transfers permitted for any wheeled vehicle.

Cozumel: I have some serious concerns about Tulum. The ship is only schedule to be in Cozumel for 8 hours and even if Carnival's tour was accessible, it is not available on all their cruises. Being a 7 hour tour, I doubt that it will be offered for your cruise.

As far as a private tour to Tulum, we once booked one starting in Playa del Carmen. That particular ship was originally scheduled for a long day in Cozumel, however it changed schedule and we had to cancel the tour. Getting to and from Playa del Carmen required a taxi ride to and from the ferry dock. Then we would have to take the ferry to and from Playa Del Carmen. Just not enough time.

There are a couple accessible taxis in Cozumel, however I have not ever seen them. If it is a folding chair or small enough to get in a van and you can get him in and out of the vehicle, you can take one of the larger standard taxis. We took a couple that managed to get two small scooters in the back. Just let the individual directing at the taxi stand know where you want to go.

This website provides a lot of useful Cozumel info http://www.cozumelinsider.com/

Montego Bay – Do not know anything beaches or tours. However there was an accessible shuttle at the terminal that goes to and from downtown. We enjoyed wandering around. If there is a lot of ships in port, there can be a very long line. Last trip we just wandered around the terminal.

Grand Cayman: My experience with Carnival using local accessible tenders is that it does not happen; Carnival will use their own tenders.

Have a wonderful cruise,

Betty

Welcome to Cruise Critic. I can only help with two questions. Grand Cayman is a tender port. Not sure if he will be able to get off the ship at this port. Cozumel had a taxi/shuttle stand. (Follow the signs). They have shuttles that are wheel chair accessible. I'm sure other people will chime in with help.

Thank you for the reply. We haven't planned to even try to get off the ship in Grand Cayman because it is a tender port, but surprisingly, of the three the accessible excursion that are available on the Carnival website, The one that interested us the most was on Grand Cayman. We may just have to explore by ourselves using the taxi/shuttle system.

If these are "ship" excursions - meaning you pay the ship, not a private provider - then unless the excursions are noted as being accessible they will not be. Usually the excursions are on large buses and have three to five or six large steps before you get to the seats. I have much better luck using private tour providers. As noted above, Grand Cayman is a tender port. IF the cruise line uses a local tender boat that is accessible there is a chance you will be able to go ashore. However if the ship uses its own life boats to provide the tender service access to these small boats is only possible if you can do three to five steps. The crew are not authorized to lift a person from the tender dock to the boat itself. Regardless of the type of tender used, if the sea is even slightly rough there will be no transfers permitted for any wheeled vehicle.

I have just been looking at the excursions offered on the Carnival website and hoping that the busses might be accessible, just the activity might not be suitable for someone that might be powering the wheelchair by them selves. I'm pretty good at getting Jason around if we can just get there. I've looked at a few private tours but I am afraid they are out of our budget. We have already decided to explore the ship when we are in Grand Cayman. Thank you so much for the reply.

Cozumel: I have some serious concerns about Tulum. The ship is only schedule to be in Cozumel for 8 hours and even if Carnival's tour was accessible, it is not available on all their cruises. Being a 7 hour tour, I doubt that it will be offered for your cruise.

As far as a private tour to Tulum, we once booked one starting in Playa del Carmen. That particular ship was originally scheduled for a long day in Cozumel, however it changed schedule and we had to cancel the tour. Getting to and from Playa del Carmen required a taxi ride to and from the ferry dock. Then we would have to take the ferry to and from Playa Del Carmen. Just not enough time.

There are a couple accessible taxis in Cozumel, however I have not ever seen them. If it is a folding chair or small enough to get in a van and you can get him in and out of the vehicle, you can take one of the larger standard taxis. We took a couple that managed to get two small scooters in the back. Just let the individual directing at the taxi stand know where you want to go.

This website provides a lot of useful Cozumel info http://www.cozumelinsider.com/

Montego Bay – Do not know anything beaches or tours. However there was an accessible shuttle at the terminal that goes to and from downtown. We enjoyed wandering around. If there is a lot of ships in port, there can be a very long line. Last trip we just wandered around the terminal.

Grand Cayman: My experience with Carnival using local accessible tenders is that it does not happen; Carnival will use their own tenders.

Have a wonderful cruise,

Betty

Tulum is offered through the Carnival website as an excursion for our cruise. My hope was that the busses used to transport people to Tulum would be wheelchair accessible, just not the tour. If we could get Jason there in his chair we would just sight see from the grounds. Jason's chair is a fixed chair and he is unable to sit up without it so we are unable to transfer safely to a seat. The private accessible tours I've found are a bit out of our budget, but it sounds like the taxi or shuttle systems might be better than I thought. We might just have to explore whatever is around the ports.

Thank you for your reply.

Certainly agree with you regarding the prices the tour companies charge. I do not object to a modest price adjustment because of the special equipment or assistance, but prices that are four or five times higher than what able bodied have to pay are unreasonable. The taxi drivers in Cozumel charge us $5 more than the posted price for the same destination. That was a lot charge for both scooters. Certainly reasonable price and we still tipped.

Do not remember the name of the company I was working with in Playa del Carmen for the Tulum tour. The price was very reasonable. That was 8 years ago. Recently I have noticed many of these places charging considerably higher prices.

Have you considered San Gervasio? http://www.cozumelparks.com/eng/san_gervasio.cfmYears ago, when I was still playing AB, I visited there. It is not very big, but is interesting. Ruth and I stopped there on a trip, unfortunately, it was not scooter friendly. However, the large wheels on a wheelchair should be able to travel on the grounds. Also, Cozumel has been up-grading their parks to make them more accessible. Suggest you write to them and ask about the grounds. They responded when I inquired about the museum downtown. If you could get one of the accessible taxis, that would be a nice trip.

maybe give the cruise line a call as they maybe able to help you more with the info that you need to know about before you get there maybe ??

Certainly agree with you regarding the prices the tour companies charge. I do not object to a modest price adjustment because of the special equipment or assistance, but prices that are four or five times higher than what able bodied have to pay are unreasonable. The taxi drivers in Cozumel charge us $5 more than the posted price for the same destination. That was a lot charge for both scooters. Certainly reasonable price and we still tipped.

Do not remember the name of the company I was working with in Playa del Carmen for the Tulum tour. The price was very reasonable. That was 8 years ago. Recently I have noticed many of these places charging considerably higher prices.

Have you considered San Gervasio? http://www.cozumelparks.com/eng/san_gervasio.cfmYears ago, when I was still playing AB, I visited there. It is not very big, but is interesting. Ruth and I stopped there on a trip, unfortunately, it was not scooter friendly. However, the large wheels on a wheelchair should be able to travel on the grounds. Also, Cozumel has been up-grading their parks to make them more accessible. Suggest you write to them and ask about the grounds. They responded when I inquired about the museum downtown. If you could get one of the accessible taxis, that would be a nice trip.

I've never heard of San Gervasio, it sounds good. Thanks for the suggestion. The only other cruise we've been on we just got off the ship and wandered around the port area. I wanted to do more on this one. If I can find an accessible taxi, we'll be in business.

Thanks,

Thank you for the reply. We haven't planned to even try to get off the ship in Grand Cayman because it is a tender port, but surprisingly, of the three the accessible excursion that are available on the Carnival website, The one that interested us the most was on Grand Cayman. We may just have to explore by ourselves using the taxi/shuttle system.

FYI Cozumel and Grand Cayman both only have 2 accessible taxis which are often pre-booked prior to cruise.

On 10/27/2017 at 2:12 PM, JasonsDad said:

 

Tulum is offered through the Carnival website as an excursion for our cruise. My hope was that the busses used to transport people to Tulum would be wheelchair accessible, just not the tour. If we could get Jason there in his chair we would just sight see from the grounds. Jason's chair is a fixed chair and he is unable to sit up without it so we are unable to transfer safely to a seat. The private accessible tours I've found are a bit out of our budget, but it sounds like the taxi or shuttle systems might be better than I thought. We might just have to explore whatever is around the ports.

 

Thank you for your reply.

Did you ever figure this one out as I am in same situation with my daughter and would be interested in doing the same thing but am having a difficult time trying to find out if there is w/c accessible transportation to / from Tulum? Thank you. 

26 minutes ago, shelly222 said:

 

Did you ever figure this one out as I am in same situation with my daughter and would be interested in doing the same thing but am having a difficult time trying to find out if there is w/c accessible transportation to / from Tulum? Thank you. 

We were not able to find accessible transportation to Tulum. We found accessible taxis for a reasonable price at thisiscozumel.com. and booked it for 5 or 6 hours. The driver was great and friendly, he didn't speak the best English but we all understood him. We went to the San Gervasio ruins, as mentioned in a post above, that are on the island. They aren't as grand as Tulum but much easier to get to and we had a great time and I would recommend this as an alternative. Pushing the manual wheelchair took some work on some of the paths but it was worth it seeing my son have such a good time. The rest of the time we went to the east side of the island for sightseeing and lunch.

2 hours ago, JasonsDad said:

We were not able to find accessible transportation to Tulum. We found accessible taxis for a reasonable price at thisiscozumel.com. and booked it for 5 or 6 hours. The driver was great and friendly, he didn't speak the best English but we all understood him. We went to the San Gervasio ruins, as mentioned in a post above, that are on the island. They aren't as grand as Tulum but much easier to get to and we had a great time and I would recommend this as an alternative. Pushing the manual wheelchair took some work on some of the paths but it was worth it seeing my son have such a good time. The rest of the time we went to the east side of the island for sightseeing and lunch.

Thank you so much. Will look into that. Sounds wonderful! So glad your son had a great time.. I am the same way.. Hope you can enjoy many more wonderful times with him...