Las Vegas: My First Time Flying As A Full-Time Wheelchair User—Well, where do I start on this amazing city? My husband and I went to Las Vegas for one main purpose: to see Billy Idol in concert. When he was playing in the UK last year, hubby broke his leg. As he is my carer/driver, I was unable to go. So when I heard he was doing a residency in LV, I just had to go.
Our Booking
We booked our trip for October 2019 directly with British Airways. We dealt with a very nice man who answered all my questions and sorted everything out for us. From the hotel, flights/seats and disability assistance. I was extra nervous as I hadn’t flown in over 20 years. This was my first time flying as a full-time wheelchair user, so I had many worries due to all the horror stories I had been reading about disabled people being left on the plane. Wheelchairs have broken or are going missing. I wasn’t doing myself any favours.
We booked fairly early in the year, so we had roughly 10 months to wait. Everything seemed to run smoothly, and BA regularly emailed us to update us regarding our booking. We were flying from Gatwick to McCarran Airport.
Gatwick
On the morning of our long weekend in Vegas, we arrived at Gatwick and parked in the long-stay car park. Then we got the bus to the South Terminal, which was wheelchair accessible. We did try to check in on the BA app the night before, but this wasn’t working too well. So we went to check in. This went smoothly, and we told the lady we had assistance booked, and she directed us where to go. We decided to grab a bite to eat before going to assistance as we had turned up extremely early. We thought traffic might be bad. As we had to be there 3 hours before departure (long-haul flight)…..We turned up 4 hours before, lol.
We were given a beeper at the assistance desk and told that when it went off, we had to return to the desk to be taken to board the plane. So the only sensible thing left to do now was go shopping. We had approximately 2 hours or so to kill before departure.
When our beeper went off, we returned to assistance. We were taken to the plane. Jeff (hubby) also required assistance. He can not walk very far, so he jumped in one of their electric buggies where I followed behind. Well, I say behind, I was left for dust, really. Thank god I knew what gate I was aiming for, which I might add was miles away!!
The Plane
At the plane door, I transferred into an aisle chair. This is a tiny piece of equipment; my backside only just fitted on the seat!! I was highly embarrassed to see that most of the passengers had already boarded the plane. This meant I had to pass them all as I was pulled along with my hips hopping of each seat as I passed. Our seats were at the very back of the plane as this was the only place that had two seats instead of 3. I felt a row of 2 seats would be better for transferring in/out of the aisle chair if/when I needed the loo. The toilets were pretty much just behind these seats. No passengers to pass mid-flight!
Well, the flight was probably the coldest I have been in a very long time. The air conditioning must have been on full blast! I wrapped up in a blanket and still couldn’t get warm.
TIP 1 – Take something warm to wear on the flight or you WILL freeze!!
The entertainment system on this plane was pretty naff to say the least. The screen was very small (compared to the one coming home). The section where you can track your flight journey was not working. When trying to watch a film, you could see the grid lines embedded in the screen. Even the Wi-fi was broken, so I tried to get some sleep as I knew when we landed, we would have been up nearly 24 hours due to time difference. However, being so cold, I found this impossible!!
Toileting
I had spent the day watching my liquid intake as I didn’t know how I was going to cope with the toilet onboard. Jeff had to go long before I did, and he came back saying he didn’t think I would cope…. Excellent, that’s just what I wanted to hear!! He explained the door to the toilet faced the toilet itself. This meant I would not be able to transfer onto the toilet from the aisle chair. I sat pondering my options and trying to figure out how to get onto the toilet in such a small space.
Jeff then disappeared and when he came back, he told me there was another toilet on the other side of the plane (Jeff used the one directly behind us). The second one he found looked more promising. The door was at the side of the toilet. Indeed this was the answer I needed. It even had a handrail for me to hold onto whilst I transferred.
Tip 2 – Do check to see if there are other toilets laid out differently as this might make the difference in whether or not you can actually go.
Comfort
I packed my cushion along with my wheelchair in the hold luggage. BIG MISTAKE! I was in excruciating pain the whole way. The plane seats were quite hard, and my coccyx got very sore. I didn’t make the same mistake coming home!
Tip 3 – Make sure if you have a cushion on your chair, you take it on board with you to use.
If you can, (I know airlines normally prefer us disabled to have an aisle seat) get a window seat, the views over Iceland/Greenland are out of this world!!
Vegas Airport
Arriving at McCarran airport, I had the dreaded aisle chair fiasco again. Thankfully, I was last off, so there were no passengers gawping at me. My wheelchair was at the plane door waiting for me; yippee. What a relief—no damage at all! Once transferred, we were taken to customs. Once through there, we were on our own.
We went outside to look for a taxi to take us to our hotel the Excalibur. I was so cold from the plane, I was delighted to see the sun shining brightly. I just had to sit in it for 5 minutes to warm my bones up. The weather at this time of year is wonderful and hot! (Well, you are in the middle of the Nevada desert).
We were advised to go to one of the taxi booths outside. We waited in line at one of them for what felt like half an hour, so we decided to move along to another booth. The prices advertised (correct in Oct 2019) ranged from $9.50 to $11, and on one of the booths, there was a $50 price in brackets advertised as airport tax. I have no idea what this meant. Was this another $50 on top of the trip’s price itself?
Feeling a little nervous, we went around the corner only to find we could get a bus (the SDX bus) that went from the airport to quite a few of the hotels along the famous Vegas strip. So we decided to jump on one of these to take us to our hotel. This only cost us $2 each way.
The Strip Buses
We spent the whole weekend jumping on and off buses up and down the strip as all buses were wheelchair accessible. I can’t speak for all of America, but in Vegas, all the drivers get out of their cab, put the ramp down, and then board the bus. If any passengers are sitting in the priority seats and a wheelchair user needs this space, the passengers are told to move, the seats are then folded up, you then park your chair in that space where the driver then clamps your chair to the bus.
Honestly, I was amazed at how efficient the bus service was. I’m terrified of using public transport (buses) here in London. In Vegas, I would use them all by myself anytime!!
While travelling up and down the strip, there is another bus route called the Deuce. This is a gold and blue double-decker bus that runs very frequently up and down the strip daily. The SDX bus I previously mentioned goes up and down the strip but does deviate at certain points along the strip. Therefore, depending on where you start your journey and where you wish to go, you may have to get off the SDX bus and jump on the Deuce bus or vice versa.
Full info can be found here: https://www.visitlasvegas.com/experience/post/getting-around-vegas/
This tells you what you need to know about the buses that go up & down the strip. It is also much cheaper than getting taxi’s everywhere as they use meter’s to charge for your journey, so if you’re stuck in traffic, which is pretty much every journey, then your fare is going to be expensive.
Tip 4 – If you can, use the Deuce or SDX buses when travelling up and down the strip. Daily bus passes are fairly cheap.
The Excalibur Hotel
We arrive at our hotel, the Excalibur. This is a themed hotel (as all of the hotels along the strip are). The Excalibur has a medieval theme with a castle look to it. Inside, you are greeted with stone walls and knights scattered around upon ledges in the walls.
You can go into any of the hotels along the strip and use their amenities, shops, casinos, and restaurants, but I will say this about all the hotels that we went into to look around: They are all freezing. The air conditioner is on full blast all the time. I can only assume this is because so many people have complained about the hotels/casinos being very smokey, as there is not a no-smoking ban in Vegas.
I have to say, although freezing, it certainly keeps the smoke at bay. There was no smell of smoke at all!! One or two of the hotels did smell musty and damp but not of smoke.
Being a wheelchair user, I booked an accessible room. It was basic but had all the amenities you could want, well most, we had no tea/coffee facilities in our room. I believe all hotels in America offer room only type of rooms.
Accessibility
Our accessible room came with the following:
- Big double bed – I woke up in the middle of the night and thought Jeff had got up to go to the toilet, I didn’t realise he was on the other side of the bed lol
- Wet room bathroom with wheel in shower-including a shower chair
- Hairdryer
- Iron/ironing board
- Two armchairs
- Table with a mirror above
- Flat-screen TV opposite the bed
- Wardrobe
- Plenty of drawer/cupboard space
- A safe inside one of the cupboards
There were only two drawbacks to our room,
- The sink in the bathroom was far from an appropriate height for a wheelchair user – It was far too high
- There was no tea/coffee-making facility in the room – Although you could go downstairs where there were snack vendors selling tea/coffee and pastries
Jet Lag
We landed in Vegas at 3:15 PM and got to our hotel approximately 6:30 PM. Due to having been up over 24 hours at this point, we decided to grab a bite to eat and then just crash into bed. There was a food court on level 1, which had approximately seven or eight different places to eat.
Tip 5: We found that a lot of the food in Vegas was very greasy. Something to bear in mind. However, there are many places where you can get food that is not as greasy. So, it is worth shopping around.
Concert Day
We awoke Saturday at 2:00 am due to the time difference and to my horror, found my electric wheelchair had not been charging since being plugged in. I had plugged my wheelchair and electrical outlet correctly, but there was still no charge! Jeff checked my wheelchair, charger and plugs and found nothing wrong with any connections. It turns out that we had completely overlooked as we didn’t know the electrical voltage used in the USA is different to here, in the UK. We (UK) use 240v, but in the USA, they use 110v, meaning their voltage was not powerful enough to charge my chair. I was mortified, how on earth was I going to be able to use my chair for the concert, the very thing we flew thousands of miles for!!
Solution?
We spent all day Saturday trying to fix my charging issue. We went to a local electrical store to purchase a step-up/down transformer, which turned out to be faulty. When Jeff returned it, he found that he had bought the last one in stock.
We hoped reception might have been able to help us. Surely, I would not have been the first electric wheelchair user to have suffered this problem! Unfortunately, they didn’t know what we were going on about.
We then spoke with the manager, Andy Matteucci (Bell Captain), at the bellboy’s desk. He was a lifesaver. He spent several hours trying to solve my problem, including getting one of his engineers to confirm that the machine we had bought was faulty.
Thankfully, my prayers were answered, as this fixed my problem. However, there was one problem. Presumably, the charger wasn’t powerful enough to charge my chair properly because of the electrical outlet voltage. Meaning, I had to carry the charger around with me to keep charging my chair at regular intervals, we also had to hire the scooter.
Tip 6: Speak to your wheelchair service/provider/manufacturer and ask their advice on charging your chair in the USA or abroad. Invacare, my wheelchair manufacturer, advised me to purchase a 110v charger. This came at the lovely price of £300. Yeah, right. I won’t spend that kind of money on a piece of equipment that I may only use once. If I return, I will further research those step-up/down transformers.)
The Concert
We went to Las Vegas to see Billy Idol in concert. As you can see from the image above, this was a dream come true! Billy Idol’s concert was at the Palms Casino resort hotel. The hotel decor was rather plush, but the view I had in the auditorium at the back of the theatre was crap! I was in a space that had what I would describe as a cinema seat on either side of me (presumably, carer/PA seats).
The auditorium was tired, and I sat directly behind the last row of seats. The moment people got up to dance, which was as soon as the music started, I may as well have stuck on an eye mask as I would have had a better view! The irony was that to the right of the auditorium, there was a balcony full of wheelchair users. None of them had any obstruction to their views whatsoever.
I spoke with the usher, explained my issue and asked if I could sit to the left of the pillar by the stairs that led down into the auditorium. He said no!
I explained that my view was non-existent so I would have to leave, as it wasn’t worth staying. He told me to hang on, he left and when he came back, he told me I could sit by the pillar. It wasn’t the best solution, but better than nothing.
Tip 7: When booking concert tickets for any venue, research or contact the venue to find out exactly where you are seated and if your view will be obstructed. If, like me, you have to book a wheelchair space at the venue, you are limited to where you can be seated, so it’s worth finding this information out before booking!
Our Last Day
So, after sadly having our first day taken from us due to my wheelchair issues, we had an awful lot to cram into one day. Wow, we were gonna be busy! We were told you could not visit Vegas and not go to Fremont Street as this experience was not to be missed. So we jumped on a bus (Deuce) and took it to Fremont Street. Here is where the Vegas Strip originally started. It is one long street filled with shops, casinos and restaurants, with a roof cover that lights up. At one end of the street, you can jump on a zip wire and travel the length of the street. Did you know the Golden Nugget casino here is where the film Sister Act was filmed? Neither did I!
You may very well see Elvis and some showgirls, but be careful, though. We passed a couple of showgirls two or three times, and each time, they asked us to take a picture with them, which we refused. Towards the end of the day, Jeff decided to bite the bullet and have his picture taken with them. It is customary to tip these picture opportunity people for a better phrase.
Pictures
So before taking his picture, Jeff asked, “How much”? They answered, “Whatever you felt like giving”. After the picture was taken, we handed the girls $10 each. One of the girls took this money, and the other asked: “Have you anything nice for me”? Jeff explained that the $20 was for both of them, to which they responded by informing us that they normally get $20 each! Sorry, $40 for a photo that you take with your camera? (I’m in the wrong business).
Be warned, though. There are many sights you may wish to forget. For example, we saw what can only be described as an elderly lady wearing a G string, nipple doilies, a masquerade lace mask, and a whip in one hand. She found it very amusing to slap men’s backsides as they passed by.
Tip 8: If you intend to have your picture taken regularly with these photo opportunity people, make sure you have plenty of spending money. In my opinion, you will be fleeced!!
After our eventful day, my wheelchair was drained, so I had to use the scooter Jeff had hired that evening. We rode up and down the strip, seeing it all lit up and grabbing a few photos. The strip at night is worth seeing!!
Time To Go Home
We were very sad because we felt we just didn’t have the time we needed to see and do everything we wanted. Checking out of the hotel was very easy. There were machines by reception that you could use rather than queue up. All you had to do was input your name and email address and confirm you were checking out.
So, back to the airport we go! Jumped on another bus (SDX) to take us back to the airport and got a little confused as to which side of the road we needed to be on. The traffic is going in the opposite direction to here in the UK. We asked someone and were directed to a bus stop, only to find we were on the wrong side of the road and on the wrong road, lol. We should have been literally on the side, just around the corner.
Checking in was a little slow as the man dealing with us didn’t have a clue how to check in a wheelchair user! He went back and forth, asking me the same questions repeatedly. One thing I didn’t understand was that when booking, I had to input all the necessary info regarding my wheelchair, weight, dimensions, battery type, etc. Yet, here I was giving all this info all over again at all the airports I passed through.
Tip 9: Carry a handy information sheet with all this information whenever you go through the airport. You will be asked repeatedly for it!
Leaving Vegas
We went to the assistance desk and were told that this time, we had priority boarding. We were told to go to the boarding desk approximately an hour before take-off. When the time came for pre-boarding, we were already at the seating area by the desk waiting. I was taken to the plane door, where I had to transfer into an aisle seat, and then I was told to wait.
The gentleman dealing with me had to go and help another passenger. So I was left in this aisle chair and sat by the plane door, waiting, waiting and waiting. Passengers had now started to board the plane, all passing me by a looking! Even the cabin crew started to look worried! Eventually, the man returned. I was finally boarding the plane, and yes, you guessed it, the aisle chair fiasco once again!!
Although that was bad enough, the biggest issue with our return flight was the disability assistance at Gatwick……It didn’t arrive!! When we arrived back at Gatwick, I was told by a member of the cabin crew that I wasn’t down as a “carry-on”. I explained that BA themselves booked this and, nearer our flight date, confirmed all was well. After investigation, it turned out that another lady (who had NO assistance booked) got my assistance.
This now meant my electric wheelchair had NOT been brought to the plane door! How does this kind of mistake happen?? Getting off the plane at Gatwick, the man taking me down the plane’s aisles had no idea what he was doing. He kept bashing my hips into the seats, and at one point, I had to reach out and physically stop him as he nearly crashed my legs into a doorway arch halfway down the plane!! Causing me lots of pain!!
Lost Wheelchair
Because of this major cock-up, I was made to transfer from the plane seat onto the aisle chair and then into another chair onboard the jetty bus that was at the plane door, I then had to be taken to luggage claim, where I was again made to transfer into another wheelchair so I could be taken off the bus into the terminal entrance.
At this point, no one could tell me where my electric wheelchair was or even it had been taken off the plane. I became so worried I almost went into panic mode. Eventually, my electric wheelchair was found and, yet again, transferred into it. This caused me a great deal of physical pain in my coccyx, arms and back. I am still in pain as I write this! Then, once I was in my chair, we were left alone! All assistance was just gone. We had no idea where or what to do next!
My husband, who also had assistance booked, was left to walk everywhere and struggle to find and lift our luggage!! His assistance was non-existent!! So he also is in great pain!! Unfortunately, this kind of mistake is out of our control; we can only book assistance and get confirmation as soon as possible. Beyond this, our assistance is literally in the hands of the gods!! I count myself lucky, though; it could have been a lot worse in the respect my wheelchair could have been damaged, I am thankful for small mercies!!!
Conclusion
We had a fantastic time and will go again. Yes, we had our ups and downs, but it was well worth it in the end. We didn’t have the time to spend in the casinos due to our issues with my chair. Next time I may have a flutter
It is a noisy place with machines pinging and beeping in the casinos, the general hustle and bustle of the strip and all the traffic. The lights are amazing but I can see how they could be very overwhelming for some. The weather is great if you love the sun, we found it not too hot and not too cold (unless in a hotel).
My Tips
- Wear warm clothing; we froze on the flight!!
- Check other toilets on the plane – They may be laid out differently.
- If you have a cushion on your chair, take it to your plane seat; it can make all the difference.
- If you can, take the Deuce or SDX buses when travelling up and down the strip. They are fairly cheap.
- The food can be very greasy. However, there are many places where you can get food that is not greasy, so do shop around.
- Please speak to your wheelchair service or manufacturer to ask what their advice is on charging your chair in the USA or abroad.
- When booking concert tickets, try your best to research or contact the venue to find out exactly where you are seated and if your view will be obstructed.
- If you intend to have your picture taken regularly with these photo opportunity people, make sure you have plenty of spending money. Otherwise, you will be fleeced!
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