Real-world accessible travel guidance for wheelchair users, from lived experience.
Practical, lived-experience travel advice to reduce stress, protect your wheelchair, and help you fly with confidence.
Who this site is for
This site is designed for individuals who want to travel but require clear, practical guidance that accurately reflects life with a wheelchair.
- People new to life in a wheelchair,
- Wheelchair users returning to travel after injury,
- Anyone anxious about flying with a wheelchair,
- Families, OTs, and support workers helping someone travel.
Why this matters
If you’re new to flying as a wheelchair user, the stress is real, and it’s normal. This site is built from lived experience, with practical steps that reduce anxiety and help protect your chair and your independence.
New to Wheelchair Travel: A Safe Place to Start
If you’re feeling nervous or unsure, that’s completely normal.
This information is here to support you at your own pace. Whether you’re planning your very first trip or returning to travel after an injury, this is a safe place to begin.
Start with the checklist, then work through the flying steps, and finally plan for what you’ll need once you arrive at your destination. Take it one step at a time.
Lived Experience
Airline Rules Explained
Advocacy That Gets Results
Before you start planning your trip, make sure you have everything you need ready to go.
Check your wheelchair measurements, have your battery details handy and download the pre-flight checklist
Before your journey
Before You Leave Home: Preparing Your Chair, Paperwork, and Yourself
Flying with a wheelchair
Flying in a Wheelchair, Step by Step: Clear Guidance for Every Stage of the Journey
If this is your first time flying as a wheelchair user, or you’ve had a difficult experience in the past, it’s normal to feel uncertain.
This page is designed to help you understand what to expect, how to prepare, and how to protect your independence, step by step, at your own pace.
You’ll find information on airline assistance, wheelchair handling, transfers, batteries and equipment, and what usually happens at each stage of the journey.
You don’t need to read everything at once. Start with the sections that feel most relevant to you.
On the Ground
Touching Down, Taking Control: From Arrival to Staying Independent.
Protecting Your Wheelchair When Flying:
Practical Steps from Check-In to Arrival
Real Journeys, Real Voices: Honest Wheelchair Travel Stories
Get practical wheelchair travel tips, airline updates, and advocacy news from lived experience.
Your experience matters. If you have a story to share, you’re welcome to add your voice here.
We Deserve Better
Turning Experience into Change: Advocating for Safer, More Respectful Air Travel
ABOUT THE BLOG
The Travelling Para is practical, lived-experience guidance for wheelchair users who want to travel with more confidence, especially when flying. Here you’ll find checklists, airline rules explained in plain English, pressure care tips, and advocacy to help protect your independence.
New to travelling in a wheelchair? Start here.
Flying with a wheelchair: what airlines don’t explain clearly.
NEWSLETTER
I’m working on a newsletter sharing practical wheelchair travel tips, airline updates, and real-world lessons as the site grows.
For now, feel free to get in touch if you’d like to be notified when it launches.
PROFESSIONAL RESOURCES
Rehabilitation Units & Hospitals
For Health Professionals
A practical, evidence-informed resource designed to support wheelchair users with air travel preparation, hospital discharge planning, and community reintegration.
For in-services, staff education, or resource use enquiries:
mailto:thetravellingpara@gmail.com
Built from lived experience as a wheelchair user, practical, independent, and advocacy-driven.
Being featured as the cover story in Australia’s national disability magazine is something I never imagined when my life changed forever in Nepal in 2018. At the time, I was an avid traveller, always planning the next adventure. A spinal cord injury left me a T10 complete paraplegic and facing nearly two years in hospitals…