Amy
Oulton uses a wheelchair due to a connective tissue disorder. After a
year-and-a-half of planning, she and her friend Steph backpacked through
Asia, visiting Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Japan. Although
her experiences would not necessarily hold true for other people who use
wheelchairs, she shares some things she learned along the way,
including some rather personal travel details.
1. You can take a wheelchair just about anywhere…although you won’t always be in it.
I
took my wheelchair places I never thought I could go, including
wheeling into a river to wash an elephant with a tiny bucket. I found
that often the only way to accommodate my wheelchair was to separate
myself from it; I had to bum-shuffle into and around my chosen method of
transportation. By bungee-cording my wheelchair to vehicles, I managed
to travel on boats, tuk-tuks, and motorbikes. This did mean I spent most
of the trip with a brown-stained bum and quickly realized the flashing
hazards of the dresses I had brought.
2. Things can get really personal.
There’s
nothing quite like your wheelchair being strapped to the roof of the
Mekong boat you’ll be on for two days, weak legs and appalling stability
even on steady land, a heavy flow, a Mooncup, a squat toilet, and no
running water to bring you closer to the friend you’re traveling with.
Read
the rest of Oulton's list and see pictures of the trip at Buzzfeed.
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