Allure Review- Mobility Scooter- 9/4/11

[waterdave]

Hello all, I just thought I would follow up on my recent questions about mobilty scooters with a review of how it went.

 

I rented a medium sized mobility scooter for my dad who is retired now and 81, and has a bad hip, numbness in one of his hands and not so great eye-sight.

I was worried that potential crowds, noise, elevators, hallways, etc might annoy him, but he absolutely loved the cruise, this being the first cruise for him in 25 years, and was fascinated by the size of the boat and the great personalized service.

 

We had requested a wheel chair for the check-in process, so when we arrived at the port by taxi I flagged down a customer service guy, and the wheelchair was there in a few minutes. The wheelchair attendant escorted him through security, check in, and to the stateroom, with no problems.

 

The scooter was in the regular size ocean view stateroom when got there. It fits through the door no problem, but there is not a lot of extra room in this regular cabin with the scooter present. It requires reversing out of the room. The hallways are wide enough for the scooter to pass the housekeeping carts relatively easy.

 

Elevators were swamped for the first 24 hours of the cruise, making it difficult to enter and exit, but the rush died down as people got settled and stopped exploring so much. IN the busy moments I would say that Yes, there are some inconsiderate people who dont really care if an elderly person on a scooter was waiting to enter the elevator, BUT they are outnumbered by considerate people that are generally polite. The ettiquette I would use is as follows: I would have us pass on the first elevator that reached, but for the second elevator I would direct my dad into into the elevator regardless of who else rushed in ahead of us. In general I thought that worked for us, and is fair.

 

We made sure to be at our assembly area 30 minutes before scheduled muster, so that we could use the elevator to get there (elevators are shut down for muster drill). Our muster station was the aquatheater so we found seats and my father was able to stay seated on the scooter, making it a simple process.

 

The most popular area to cruise around with the scooter was central park. The park cafe was easy to pull up and park near, and was generally peaceful. Also of course the royal promenade and boardwalk are great runners up.

 

For the MDR dining, we parked the scooter by the bar at the entrance to the hall (Adagio Deck 3 6pm), and my dad walked in with his cane no problems. I noticed other people with scooters also had their waiters valet the scooter to their table and back, we didnt need to do that though.

 

SO, all in all it was a success, and although we could have rented a cheaper and easier wheelchair, I think my dad really enjoyed the sense of freedom on the scooter, and this also really helped him appreciate the ship and evrything it had to offer.