People of Size / 2 Scooters / Air Travel & Ground Transp

[five.]

Going to Alaska in May and depart from Seattle. There are four adults and two of them have mobility scooters. Around town locally, we regularly travel together in a minivan with the scooters in the back. Before we travel, we plan to attempt the scooters, plus the luggage and see if that is possible. When we get to Seattle we will have a few days in advance to go around the city and will be renting a minivan and maybe a second additional vehicle. For now we are planning to stay at an AirBNB that has all of the accessibility stuff that we need. It's a bit of a drive from everything (45 minutes) but we may also check local hotels a second time and see if we can find anything that is closer that can accommodate them, that is not crazy expensive. But regardless of that, I feel like on that side of the trip we are in pretty decent shape.

 

The return trip has me more concerned, trying to come up with a plan. So the return flight is at 11:05, so that rules out Carnival transportation, flights have to be later than 11:45 to use their shuttles. I have reached out to shuttle express, but have not heard back from them. I contacted yellow cab and they said we could do two taxi van's equipped with wheelchair access. $47 per taxi. And since we are doing two, even if we had to carry off our luggage, I think we'd be in fine shape. So I think we are good to use this as an option. I am also considering an uberxl if we are able to use the Port Valet service and it's just the scooters and 4 adults. I just know that it's a bit random on the vehicle that will pick us up, either minivans or large suv's.

 

The two in mobility scooters are people of size, so flying was also a concern, but I've booked them in first class, debated between that and three economy, with a seat between them. So I think that part is alright. As far as getting their luggage checked-in at the airport and through security, I plan to just manhandle through I suppose. If anyone has any tips about this sort of thing traveling through CLT or SEA feel free to chime in.

 

Many thanks for taking time to read through and give your thoughts, if you've been through similar. Usually it's just the two of us, but taking her parents with us this time and it's a lot more logistics for me to think through.

[1threadshort]

i am of size and travel w/scooter. i however, do not rent a scooter til im on the ship. i tell the airport that i need assistance. they provide a wheelchair and wheel me to whatever gate i need. they take my luggage from the time the limo pulls up to the airport. thats why i do not bring my own scooter. because i go right thru customs, get to the gate w/them.

 

[katisdale]

I flew yesterday from LAX to CLT. We flew out of CLT on 12/19 and it was the usual procedure. I highly recommend getting pre-check. That said, coming back was very different. The recent air strike in Iran rated an increase in threat level. We had not heard of this. I got an extremely thorough search of me and my wheelchair at LAX. I would leave plenty of time for that. I have my own "fold and go" power wheelchair which made the flight quite well. I was able to power to the gate in CLT and LAX. In CLT I was required to transfer to an airport chair at the jet-way while my chair was taken to an elevator. In both directions my chair survived unscathed. The experience was just very different from what I have experienced in the past.