Travel is Great!

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I have been extremely fortunate to experience quite a variety of travel to an extensive list of locations since my accident. Growing up I had been privileged to do a lot of travelling including some overseas trips which I suppose gave me the travel bug.  I did a few more trips to the UK and Europe after completing school and before my accident but the majority of my travel has been since the accident.

Prior to the accident I loved to drive.  Cars were my life so anywhere I could go in a car was exciting and interesting for me but after the accident accessing vehicles became quite difficult and as I could no longer drive I was dependent on others to take me everywhere so for a while I didn’t really have a lot of interest in road trips.  It felt so strange having to be a passenger and all it did was remind me of my inability to do what I previously loved – drive. For quite some time after my health had improved sufficiently to be able to get out and about in the wheelchair I still chose to stay at home much of the time because it felt safe.

However, as the months passed I felt the urge to do some travel.  My first trip was with my mother to the Brisbane Expo and this gave me a taste of how I could manage with flights. 

I also went for a helicopter flight which proved somewhat hair-razing for my brother-in-law who thought I was about to fall out of the open door (we still laugh about this incident as I maintain I was IN control whereas he states I had lost my balance and was about to fall out).  Following that I did several short trips with family members to resorts in Port Douglas and Fiji as well as a trip to Hawaii with my best mate Paul from school days.

Next I planned an extensive USA road trip and my sister, Madeleine, and I thoroughly enjoyed several weeks travelling long distances across numerous States and visiting many places that I’d previously only seen on the TV.  By this stage I felt that I had conquered most of my travel concerns although I had managed to hit the pavement on more than one occasion in New York when attempting to access a vehicle as the car doors don’t open as wide as those I was accustomed to in Australia.  

I also encountered a number of problems when travelling with a wheelchair including 

• having the wheelchair taken apart by US Customs Agents and searching it piece by piece for drugs and then sending it out on the luggage carousel still in pieces, 
• flat tyres due to valve damage in transit, 
• transferring to/from airline seats, 
• accommodation places that really didn’t provide accessible rooms with all the necessary modified facilities even though they stated in their advertising that they did, 
• airlines insisting that I wear a catheter for the duration of a flight, which I ripped of after the flight started as I needed a straw, (can you believe it an airline like Qantas having no straws, young children use them, and some disabled people do as well.)

and the list could go on. 

Travelling with a wheelchair isn’t without its challenges – many, many of them - but I concluded that travel was not only possible and a great thing to do, but it was worth all the hassles simply for the wonderful experiences it offered me. I also discovered that travelling could only be successful and enjoyable with a huge amount of research, nth degree pre-planning, excellent organisation, a willing companion who was up for a possible disaster to strike without warning at any moment and in any situation and of course a good dose of humour to help manage all those things that would inevitably go wrong.

When I met Diane my appetite for travel was increased.  At that time she was working in a regional centre in NSW so my first solo trip since my accident was by train from Sydney to Gloucester.  Mum took me to Central station and I could tell that she was super anxious about how I would manage for 5 hours on the train without any assistance but somehow I didn’t have any such worries - I was simply excited to be going on a journey to a new place.  Mum waved me goodbye as the train chugged away from the platform and I know Mum would have been thinking “will I ever see Michael again”.  All I could think about was that I was starting a new chapter of my story by having the courage and desire to make the trip by myself.  It was, in my mind, a mini adventure as I’d never been to Gloucester so everything was interesting as I looked out the windows of that train and it didn’t cross my mind that anything could or would go wrong.  I’m sure most of the passengers were bored with the scenery that they were familiar with or they were sleeping but I was excited and soaking up the opportunity to see new places as the train whizzed along.  For the first time since my accident I actually felt ‘free’ and I would say I felt that I wanted to be alive which was a complete turn-around to the years when I had been wishing I could have died in the accident.  I was still dependent on others to get me to and from the train but I felt a sense of freedom in being able to undertake a journey by myself.  This was an amazing feeling after so many years in hospital, rehabilitation and confined to the 4 walls of my unit.  

After several hours the train slowed to a crawl and I was watching out most eagerly as I knew that Diane would have left work early and already be on the platform waiting for me and peering into each carriage to try and spot me and I didn’t want to miss her in the crowd that I was anticipating.  What I didn’t realise was that Gloucester is such a small town that nobody else planned to disembark and there was nobody waiting to board the train so, as the train chugged to a halt - at a station building not much bigger than the size of a toilet block -  my eyes were peeled and I spotted one solitary figure on the platform waving in my direction. What – no welcoming party – only Diane!!!!   The train had to negotiate a stop with my carriage aligned with the very short platform so the driver and guard were communicating back and forth until they were satisfied that my carriage was at the best place for me to disembark.  Wow, where have I arrived - I'd never seen such a short platform - surely this place must be the end of the earth!!!!!  Certainly NOT what I was expecting.  

The train came to a halt and an announcement was made that the train would be delayed for several minutes while they de-trained (love that word) a passenger requiring assistance so at least I knew they hadn’t forgotten me. The train guard assisted Diane to transfer me from the train seat back into the wheelchair and down onto the platform.  In those days they hadn’t thought of platform ramps or wider exit doors so it was a bit of a struggle.  Although the old style train carriages weren’t designed for wheelchairs the trip had been manageable and thoroughly enjoyable.  

After spending several days in Gloucester and meeting all Diane’s work colleagues and church friends as well as visiting beaches at Forster and spending time in Taree and the surrounding areas it was time to train it back to Sydney.  

This time it was to be on the XPT – a much newer train so supposedly a better experience – but, when Diane boarded me the guard said ‘leave him in the wheelchair in that space outside the onboard toilets, we are running late and don’t have time to sort out the seating’ so considering I had purchased a 1st Class ticket I had quite a poor experience for the next 4.5 hours. Needless to say, this ALMOST put me off future long distance train travel as I wasn’t able to see out the windows as I was facing sideways so the motion of the train was very uncomfortable and no need to say anything about the aromas that I had to cope with in that particular area of the train.  However, I made it home safely to a very happy, smiling mother and this was the start of my whole family realising that I was once again taking control of my life and I actually did have the capacity to travel independently although, of course, I still needed assistance with some aspects of any journey.

Next I flew to Proserpine by myself in order to visit Madeleine at Shute Harbour and that was quite an experience with having to be unloaded/loaded via Fork Lift at Proserpine Airport.  I didn’t know at the time of booking that the smaller regional airlines didn’t have proper wheelchair access facilities so use of a Forklift was their only option but they knew what they were doing so it was quite a smooth and safe process even if I felt a bit like I was a guinea pig for this technique. I enjoyed seeing another small part of Qld that I hadn’t known much about before.

Diane’s father knew I enjoyed road trips so on one occasion he took me by car to Gloucester and he also took me to the Blue Mountains and of course every time Diane was in Sydney we would go for short excursions, including a trip to Canberra so I was little by little venturing further afield and seeing more and enjoying the freedom that comes with travel.  

I managed to convince Diane to take me back to Canberra a second time during the ‘Summer Nats’ and that was a real highlight for me – lots of cars, Hotrods, revving engines, numerous ‘hoons’ plus burning rubber and smoking tyres all around me.  I loved it all and I think Diane even enjoyed some of it but perhaps not being covered in tiny bits of black rubber and smelling of smoke after being seated right on the edge of the burnout track for several noisy hours.   It was these experiences that changed me from thinking about what I had lost in the accident as now I was thinking only about how fortunate I was to still be able to participate in many activities that I enjoyed doing – even from a wheelchair.  

So, by the time we got married I had already done quite a lot of travel by road, train, plane and I’d been intrastate, interstate and overseas and I guess I thought that maybe that was about it for travelling but little did I know that this was simply the start.  I have lost count of all the trips we have done in the years since we got married – many, many by road between Bundaberg and Brisbane, Bundaberg and Sydney, holidays in Rockhampton, Yeppoon, Mackay, Hervey Bay, Sunshine Coast and the Indy Cars on the Gold Coast, Cairns, Outback Qld, Tasmania, Western Australia and numerous cruises.  I’ve been Whale Watching (these days the boats are so much more accessible than when I attempted it so it’s easy now for anyone using a wheelchair) and I attended the Paralympics in Sydney in 2000 where I enjoyed a variety of sports on offer but my favourite event was the Wheelchair Rugby. 

I continued to do many trips back and forth to Sydney/Blue Mountains by car and plane in order to visit my elderly mother and on one of those road trips invited a Japanese Exchange Teacher who was working in Bundaberg and we detoured via the inland to show her some of Australia and visited Dubbo Zoo as well as Eastern Creek (she was a motor-biker herself so was eager to see the race track) and then completed the trip north via the coast road. So, at this point in my life not only was I capable of travelling and lapping it all up (despite it being quite tiring for me) but I had progressed to being a Tour Planner for ourselves as well as for international friends.  

In the years since moving to Bundaberg we’ve undertaken numerous lengthy road adventures and other trips (this list is a sample) :-

1997 - Western Qld via Emerald, Barcaldine, Winton, Longreach, Kynuna to the Qld/NT border

1998 - Western Qld round trip including Charleville, Quilpie, Windorah, Birdsville, Boulia, Mt Isa, Cloncurry, Julia Creek, Hughenden, Charters Towers, Townsville (including being caught in a flood at Boulia – now, that was SCARY).

1999 – Western Qld to Longreach then south to Blackbutt, Tambo, Charleville, Roma, Dalby, Kingaroy

2000 – Sydney Paralympics

2000 – Western Qld and NSW with Japanese friend

2001 – Melbourne – flew from Bundaberg and spent 5 days exploring the city and surrounding areas

2001 – Qld and NSW – road trip to Broken Hill via inland QLD and Western NSW and home via Bourke, Lightning Ridge, Dirranbandi and St George.

2002 – North Qld – Emerald, Charters Towers, Lava Tubes Undara, Mt Surprise, Mareeba, Cairns (here we did a Minjin Swing at AJ Hacketts  – it took many staff to make it possible but it was an absolute adrenalin rush – LOVED it and felt the urge to have a 2nd attempt it was such great fun and the guys took excellent care of me to make it perfectly safe), Townsville, Bowen, Mackay and Rockhampton.

2003 – Tasmania – flew from Bundaberg to Hobart then hired a car for a 3 week road trip

2004 – Outback Qld – retracing our steps to some of our favourite places – Longreach for School of the Air and the Hall of Fame, the Qantas Museum as well as Winton’s “Waltzing Matilda’ Museum.

2006 – Western Australia – flew from Bundaberg to Perth then hired a car for 3 weeks and headed north to Cervantes to view the Pinnacles then continued as far as Shark Bay (Monkey Mia – to swim with the Dolphins – a wonderful experience even in a water wheelchair on a brisk morning when the water was still quite chilly) and then retraced our path south to Kalbarri, Geraldton, New Norcia, Perth, Fremantle, Busselton and south all the way to Albany and the giant trees in the forests in Pemberton and Denmark before heading inland to Wave Rock at Hyden and the Stirling Ranges and finishing up in the lovely towns of Wagin, York and Beverley. 

All the above trips came with the good and the bad.  We discovered the number 1 requirement was to be resourceful.  We learnt to improvise when equipment broke and learnt to manage in poorly designed accommodation that was less than ideal for the wheelchair and I can’t begin to count how many sticky situations we found ourselves in but…………we have survived. Sometimes we’ve had to seek help from people we didn’t know and other times we have simply had no choice but to figure out a solution for ourselves as there was nobody around to assist but through it all we have proven to be a good team and by working together to resolve issues we have managed to experience and enjoy years of road trips and I have a whole bunch of photos and great memories that will last me a life-time if I never get back to those places.

By this stage of my life, my age and the associated loss of strength was starting to affect my ability to access sedan vehicles and it was becoming increasingly difficult for Diane to manage such long trips that required me to get in/out of the car repeatedly during the day with her having to do a lot more lifting with my transfers and it also meant a lot of lifting of my wheelchair in and out of the car so we felt that perhaps our days of long road trips needed to come to an end.  Fortunately, in those intervening years a fast train with easy wheelchair access had commenced service between Bundaberg and Brisbane so we no longer needed to drive back and forth but now we had the option to ‘train’ it to the Capital and this was a much more relaxing and less tiring mode of travel for that distance.  We utilised train travel as much as possible and continued to fly to Sydney and visit my mother in the Blue Mountains when she was no longer able to visit me.