South America

[Hebe]

Can anyone give me details of accessablity in the following ports :

Buenos Aires

Montevideo

Puerto Madryn

Port Standley

Ushuaia

Puerto Aernas

Puerto Montt

Valparaiso

Arica

Callao

Manta

 

Will we be able to use a wheelchair or scooter

 

thansk

[daju22]

Hi Hebe,

We were in most of these ports last year. Not Puerto Madryn or the last three you listed. We only had our wheelchair at that time. We got off the ship at all the ports and I pushed my husband around. At some of them we did tours. My husband can walk for a short distance and is slow.

Can anyone give me details of accessablity in the following ports :

Buenos Aires-docked- took bus tour. Loved BA . Took free shuttle to diamond store then pushed around. Same shuttle back.

Montevideo-docked-took free leather store shuttle to store, then pushed around the square. Shuttle took us back

Puerto Madryn

Port Standley-Nice walking & pushing town.

Ushuaia-I pushed Dave to town. Steep hill. Docked

Puerto Aernas-In Punta Arenas we did the Magdalena Island Penguin tour. Fantastic!!

Puerto Montt -docked and pushed to the vendors along the street. Wow super deals on beautiful woven goods. Best shopping of the trip. Too bad it was a rainy day.

Valparaiso Embarked here. Don't know about it.

Arica

Callao

Manta

 

Will we be able to use a wheelchair or scooter

I would imagine you can use either. If we were going today, I'd take the scooter. Much easier and we could cover more distance. There were not alot of curb cuts, so sometimes Dave had to get off and walk a few steps. All depends on what your limitations are.

Hope this helps a little. I'd go back there tomorrow. It's so beautiful. What ship are you going on?

 

thansk

[Hebe]

Hi Judy

Thank you so much for the information. It gives me an idea of what to expect. We have private tour in most of the ports. My husband is good at staying in the van if things look too hard for him or me. He really cannot stay by himself without something to hold so the curbs can be an interesting challenge.

 

We will be traveling on the Celebrity Millennium.

[daju22]

Have a wonderful trip! Our favorite country was Chile. Wish we were going too! Celebrity is our favorite line. We've been on Summit and Infinity. Next August-Constellation!

[Splinter]

We took only the manual wheelchair ashore. If the person can climb steps and curb, then a scooter might be possible (although someone would have to guard it if you leave it unattended). Most places there are steps and few curb cuts, and no wheelchair accessible travel. For example, in BA, you must take a shuttle bus from/to the ship on the pier. It is not accessible and requires about a 14" step up. We were able to get some local dock help to lift the wheelchair in/out (HAL would not help) and they would not let us push the wheelchair the several hundred feet to the terminal instead.

 

If you have a tender port, depending on the ship, they may not allow a scooter (HAL does not) on the tender lift. They only allow manual wheelchairs of 18" or less.

 

In Puenta Arenas, once you got off the tender, there was a VERY narrow stairway of about 10 steps from the dock to the pier. My mother had to be lifted in her manual chair, which was very scary.

 

Access in Port Stanley was very good, and there is a wheelchair accessible public toilet right on the main street. Access to shops varies here...some are good, others required a step or two.

 

Most shops, etc. are not ramped. With the manual chair we could easily pump up a high threshold, which you cannot do with a scooter or power chair. In addition, most of the cabs are either vans (with high steps) or subcompacts. Getting even a manual folding wheelchair into some of these cabs can be quite a challenge....a scooter would not work at all unless you can get in and out of a van by yourself. We did find several van cabs and tours where the staff were willing to lift my mother in/out of the van, but it was not easy, and she came back from this trip with a lumbar compression fracture.

 

Regardless, we had a good time, and would go back to So. American in a minute.