It was nearly a 5 hour drive to Seattle, the longest car trip Carolyn has
been on, post injury, which is not real comfortable in our rear-entry van
as she tends to get bounced around in back. We drove up the day before, having
made reservations at the Red Lion in Tukwila for a handicap accessible room.
When we got there, it turned out that they had only one accessible room, and
it was already occupied. Thanks a lot! So we tried a regular room, but the
bathroom door was too narrow for my wife’s chair to go in. We went to
another motel a couple of miles away for a couple of $ more; it was much nicer
(not only the accessible aspects).
Our first port was Juneau, where we went whale watching. Orca Enterprises’ driver Lacey picked us up in a wheelchair van and took us out to Mendenhall Glacier, where we spent an all too short hour, then to the dock where we boarded Captain Larry’s boat. He had designed his boat specifically so people like Carolyn can get on board. We saw quite a few humpback whales, as well as bald eagles and sea lions. What a thrill this was for Carolyn, who didn’t think she’d ever be able to be in a boat again. Then Lacey took us over to a place that does a salmon bake. This was crowded, as several tour buses had just arrived, so we diverted to another (independent) place, where we had very good salmon and excellent halibut, and enjoyed a pleasant and interesting conversation with Lacey. The excessive cost of the dinner was the only downside to this tour.
Next day, the ship went up to Hubbard glacier; unfortunately we couldn’t get very close due to ice. But the scenery was awesome, as it was pretty much everywhere we went in Alaska.
Then to Sitka, which is a tender port. They couldn’t manage a power chair getting on and off the small tender boat, so Carolyn stayed on board ship while I walked around the town and took a lot of photos, especially of totem poles in a park.
In Ketchikan, Carolyn took a tour to Saxman native village, a showplace for native art & culture. That was the first time she’s been on any kind of public transport without me, so I think she was rather dreading it, but she ended up having a great experience. I took a floatplane flightseeing trip on my own. Our pilot Michelle was great, and I took well over a hundred photos. I felt in excellent hands with Michelle, who shared her enthusiasm for flying and for Alaska, and who showed us some marvelous scenery (and also a bear!). Very highly recommended, but unfortunately not accessible for a non-walker or someone with very poor balance (at our stop we climbed out and walked along the float to a log next to the shore). For a lightweight with a strong helper, a helicopter trip may be a better idea; probably not a floatplane.
We missed our planned tour of Butchart Gardens in Victoria, due to Carolyn’s Foley catheter popping out (described in another thread). So that was a rather stressful afternoon/evening.
Everyone on the ship was very friendly, with one exception - we entered the
lounge some 20 minutes before a program, and parked ourselves to wait. Immediately
before the program started, I heard a woman behind us say to her friend “I
can’t see with that in front of me.” She then said to me “Can
you ask your wife to move? I can’t see.” Having heard what she
said previously, clearly referring to my wife as an unpleasant object, I was
a more than a little ticked off, so I said “Why don’t you ask
her yourself?” I may have also said something about how she could also
move her own chair to where she could see (and I think I muttered a lot more
for her to overhear). Carolyn is more forgiving and perhaps more thick-skinned
than I, and she moved to the side.
Room Information - This is a pic of our room on the Oosterdam. It was the VA6004, a reasonably large cabin with a balcony and floor to ceiling windows.
You can get a good idea of the room sizes by going to the Holland America website and looking at the deck plans.
Under-bed storage obstructed the legs of our rental Hoyer lift for about 2 feet from the foot of the bed.
Bathroom - There was a fold-down padded seat in the roll-in shower, and of course grab bars around the toilet. Although there is a pillar near the door and bathroom door, there was plenty of room to maneuver around it.
Due to some very high thresholds, a wheeler cannot go to the bow of the Oosterdam on any deck, except up on deck 10, where it is enclosed (the Crow's Nest lounge), but there is a good view through the windows there. The same deck does afford open viewing off the side, as of course do the cabins with balconies, or verandahs as HAL call them.
Overall, the Oosterdam was great! It’s a huge ship. There are bumps on the floor in numerous places, which jarred Carolyn whenever she had to go over them; they could have designed that part a little better. But we had no problems with the elevators, although we had to wait for a relatively empty one a few times. I packed lots of extra medical supplies; although most went unused, one (a Foley catheter tray) turned out to save the vacation; also a power strip and a second extension cord; both were very much needed (CPAP, chair battery charger, alarm clock with multiple settings to remind Carolyn to turn at night, camera battery charger) – the single outlet was quite a ways from the head of the bed. A bit of a nuisance was having to check our baggage the evening before disembarkation; that meant we had to haul stuff like the CPAP, clock and Hoyer sling in our carry-on bag. We had rented a Hoyer-style lift (for a rather exorbitant $285), which was in the cabin when we arrived on ship.
I owe a lot to our own KLD, who, along with others on cruisecritic.com provided much useful information that helped me to choose the ship and excursions, and prepared us well for a wonderful experience. I promised KLD I’d measure mattress height - I have it written down somewhere & will report when I can find it! I recall that it was a little high, and would probably have given us some problems doing a board transfer.
- Richard