Wheelchair help at boarding?

[audome78]

I am cruising with my 92 year old father and my 90 year old mother, celebrating their 70th wedding anniversary. We have arranged, thru, Royal's Special Needs department, for wheelchair assistance at the terminal in Long Beach. 

 

Does anyone have experience on WHERE the assistance begins and where it ends? Does it start at the curb, with luggage drop off and continue thru check in? Our does it start after check-in and only for going up the gang way?

 

I'm trying to plan for our arrival. Mom uses a walker at home, but  getting on Navigator and to her room is going to be a challenge. I have rented a wheelchair for the cruise, which will be in her room. Getting to the room from the car is the issue.

 

Any help is appreciated.

 

I am posting this on the disabled cruise forum also

[nelblu]

My only experience was in Miami and the assistance was done at check-in, although I only had one person to take care.  On the flip side,  my other experience was on the Anthem and staff held all of the wheel chaired passengers together waiting by Jamie's and then together the parade of wheelchairs disembarked.  My wife passed away a few years ago and can't recall if we received help with luggage, etc.  I do know that we had a parking spot very close to the terminal and had a side entrance which made it very easy.

Edited November 3, 2022 by nelblu

[Joseph2017China]

Generally speaking, once you get into the terminal building.  Help will be getting on to the ship only, and I'm pretty sure, they will take you to your rented wheelchair. 

[mo&fran]

My experience is at FT Lauderdale.   DW had an issue and could not even get out of the car.  Wheelchair was brought to the car and she was wheeled in, through checkin, and up to the ramp. I crew member came and took her up the ramp to wherever she wanted to go.

 Next time, she was able to leave the car, and we were directed to an area for those needing chairs waited for the chairs. same process from there.

 Disembarkation, we went to a designated spot, and were disembarked . The only question we were asked was our luggage tag number.

WE did tip every one that assisted.

[Moikturtle]

We JUST got off Navigator in San Pedro today. My mother needed a wheelchair so we went through that whole process for embarkation and debarkation.
 

After we dropped off the luggage with the porters we headed towards the long line of people to get in. The employee noticed my mother had a cane and offered the option for a wheelchair to her right away. They had a specific area for guests waiting for a wheelchair to sit really close to the entrance. Unfortunately the port does not have very many wheelchair pushers on staff so the wait at this point was pretty long.  They also said a lot of people further along in the line process had kept changing their minds and wanted a wheelchair (but those people did not get priority over the people who asked for it in the first place).  There was water right near us though and we would rather have been waiting there than standing in the lines we were fine with it. Once the person came over to push her in the chair it went pretty quickly. He was able to take us to the desk when there were issues with our check in and everything too so that was nice. Once we got through the metal detector and everything we were brought to a room with lots of people in it also waiting in wheelchairs. At first we thought we were going to end up waiting a while again but Royal Caribbean had far more people to push the wheelchairs than the port did so we left that area pretty soon. The RC staff member took us all through the gangway and the checkin when you get onto The ship. He took us to our muster station to do the checkin there. He then let us know where we could go to eat and dropped us off at Bolero’s on Deck 4. 

When it was time to get off the ship the meeting area if you would like a wheelchair is once again Bolero’s. The tv channel with disembarkation information had said to go to guest services the day before to let them know and schedule to get a wheelchair so we did. They didn’t take any information down or anything (even when I asked if they wanted to) and just gave us the flyer with disembarkation information and told us we would go to Bolero’s between 8:00am-9:15am. We were able to go eat breakfast at the main dining room beforehand (left our room at 7:45am) and got to Bolero’s without issue (Cafe Promenade and the buffet are also available until 8:30am). There are tons of seats in Bolero’s and they are comfortable we got there at around 8:40am and let them know my mom would need a wheelchair. There was a huuuuge list of people ahead of us but we were fine with the wait. Starbucks was still open so we were able to get something to drink to have while we waited (you can’t take it off the ship though). A lot of people who were called had already left without telling them to take their room number off.  They ended up calling our room number around 9:25am. It was interesting to hear all the times they kept announcing to other passengers that it was the last call to get off the ship. That is supposed to be 9:00am but we were okay because we were on the wheelchair list. That said there were still a lot of other people still getting off the ship otherwise. The wheelchair pusher from RC took us from there through the line where they scan your sea pass and down the gangway. At the base of the gangway they lined up all the people in the wheelchairs to wait for the port employees to come push them.  There were six other wheelchairs ahead of my mom and still very few port employees available to push the wheelchairs. The waiting area is outside and has very little covering. Today happened to be absolutely freezing in Los Angeles. It got to the point where my mom and I were both really struggling with the cold. We decided to wait until the majority of people who were walking had gotten off the ship and if they still hadn’t come to get her we would let the woman know that we were going to relinquish the chair and walk the rest of the way. Thankfully my mom has a cane to help her walk and that she was not alone. Oh also someone else in the line wanted to try to go without the employee pushing them and they were told that only employees hired to push the wheelchairs were allowed to push the wheelchairs.  We waited for 15-20 minutes and pretty much nobody else was getting off the ship and not one of the six people ahead of us had been taken yet. So we let the woman know and she directed us to the elevator to use that with no issue. Just as we got to the elevator two people came to get wheelchairs — but four people still would have remained ahead of us.  There were no longer crowds of people in the terminal at that point so my mother was able to take her time walking with her cane. We had no issues getting our luggage because there wasn’t a ton left by then and a porter helped us. The process going through customs was smooth because the facial recognition was working. We had a very short wait for that and walked right to the exit after. The porter was only able to help us take our stuff to the parking lot gate but we luckily parked pretty close. 
 

Hope that this information is helpful for you. Let me know if you have any questions and I will try to answer them. 

[Moikturtle]

Oh also as a side note - we were recently on Symphony as well from Miami and my parents used wheelchairs there. The process had a lot of differences which I think is because the Port of Miami has a lot more people hired to push wheelchairs and the waiting was all done indoors. Be sure to keep in mind the time of year you are going because if they are waiting outside for a long time it can get pretty hot or pretty cold sometimes (like it was for us today).

 

Edit to Add: Once you are on the ship it can be a little while before the rooms open up. Usually around 1:30pm. If you think it maybe a struggle to get them to the room you may want to consider having them stay close to Bolero’s until the rooms open up. Then if the wheelchair is in the room you can maybe go up and get it then bring it back down for use. I know it’s not ideal. If you’re all hungry you could grab food from the buffet, Cafe Promenade, El Loco Fresh, or Playmakers that day and you can bring any of it back to them wherever they are on the ship. It was also nice for my mom that the ship is really pretty short from end to end. We had been on Symphony which was HUGE and she was very surprised when I told her “okay we are at the very end of the ship now”. It made things so much easier for using her cane. 

Edited November 4, 2022 by Moikturtle

[gerif]

My late husband used wheelchair assist on several occasions. As I recall, we were met outside the terminal. If we arrived after cabins were ready we were taken directly to the cabin. Otherwise, we were left wherever we asked (WJ, Cafe Promenade) and someone would have to go to the cabin once they were ready to retrieve any rented wheelchairs/scooters. 

[smokeybandit]

If you've arranged a wheelchair through special needs, they would be a good group to ask where to meet the wheelchair

[ONECRUISER]

8 hours ago, Moikturtle said:

Oh also as a side note - we were recently on Symphony as well from Miami and my parents used wheelchairs there. The process had a lot of differences which I think is because the Port of Miami has a lot more people hired to push wheelchairs and the waiting was all done indoors. Be sure to keep in mind the time of year you are going because if they are waiting outside for a long time it can get pretty hot or pretty cold sometimes (like it was for us today).

 

Edit to Add: Once you are on the ship it can be a little while before the rooms open up. Usually around 1:30pm. If you think it maybe a struggle to get them to the room you may want to consider having them stay close to Bolero’s until the rooms open up. Then if the wheelchair is in the room you can maybe go up and get it then bring it back down for use. I know it’s not ideal. If you’re all hungry you could grab food from the buffet, Cafe Promenade, El Loco Fresh, or Playmakers that day and you can bring any of it back to them wherever they are on the ship. It was also nice for my mom that the ship is really pretty short from end to end. We had been on Symphony which was HUGE and she was very surprised when I told her “okay we are at the very end of the ship now”. It made things so much easier for using her cane. 

Yeah 20+ yrs ago Royal workers would wheel us right to our Car in the Miami Parking lot, were first group off, all at once and usually about 8-10 of us. Now, not often but been on  Cruises many as 25-30 sitting waiting just at that moment. Only taking couple at a time took so long all the rest of passengers were already off before finished

Edited November 4, 2022 by ONECRUISER