Disabled Holiday Info

My name is Frank Napper and early in 2001 my wife Sue and I wished to go away for a weekend and looked on the net for suitable destinations, bearing in mind my disability. We could not find anything that provided both places to stay and advice about what to see and do whilst there. In the end we went to York and did our own research, which we felt was worth sharing with other wheelchair users.

As I was doing a computer course at the local college at the time my tutor helped me to create a small webpage of my findings: www.disabledholidayinfo.org.uk

Encouraged by the local Tourist Information Centre in Oswestry we then visited several other areas trying out the facilities for accessibility with my own wheelchair. This was such a success that with the help of The Millennium Fund administered by Help the Aged we were able to continue to add further places of interest.

This began to involve a considerable amount of time and effort so in order to be able to develop the site further we enlisted the assistance a small group of other wheelchair users and their carers.

We then received a grant from the Bruce Wake Charitable Trust (see Worcester page) with which we were able to complete further research and add more web pages, ensuring all the time that the places of interest we visited, really were accessible.

However not everyone has access to the web so in 2005 we received funding from the Community Champions Fund (administered by the Community Council for Shropshire) to complete research for the whole of the county of Shropshire, so in addition to Oswestry and Ironbridge there were now web pages for Shrewsbury, Ludlow and Whitchurch. This information was put into a free brochure called 'The Wheelchair Users Guide to Accessible Tourist Attractions for Shropshire'. We then received further funding and design assistance from Shropshire County Council and various other sources from within the county to update and improve the brochure.

In November 2005 it was felt that the group should become more formal with elected officers and a new constitution. Our work has continued and in 2006 we have researched two more written guides for the county, one on countryside sites and trails (funded and produced by the County Council Countryside Access Team) and one on accessible activities (funded by Awards for All and produced by ourselves). All three guides can be downloaded in pdf from the News and Events page on this site or by mail from our PO Box (details in Contact Us).

We are also members of various access groups within the county and have been asked to represent people with disabilities on other committees. Recently we have received a grant from the Community Fund for Shropshire to receive training (from IIS Ltd) on our new software to enable us to redesign and update this website.

This summer we have revisited York and updated the original webpage bearing in mind all we have learnt along the way. We also held Awareness Events in and around the county where we handed out our free guides and other related accessibility information.

Our ultimate aim is to see the production of guides and web pages for the whole of the country. All based on assessment carried out by wheelchair users for wheelchair users or other people who find accessibility an issue when choosing a holiday or planning a day out. We hope these will work alongside existing information to give people not only suggestions for holiday destinations but an insight into accessible places to visit and activities to participate in whilst there. In order to achieve this we are constantly widening our network of contacts and also recently became members of ENAT (European Network for Accessible Tourism).

We have several projects planned for later in 2007 (funding permitting). The first is for further web pages and a written guide for the whole of Staffordshire. The second is for a data base of all wheelchair accessible transport available to residents of and visitors to Shropshire . This will be incorporated into webpages and will include a mapping system of accessible accommodation, attractions and countryside sites and trails. We also hope to produce a booklet detailing the information that will compliment our existing guides. Lastly we have the funding in place for Alan Thomas (who is a wheelchair user and a member of Ataxia South Wales) who has agreed to research a webpage for the Carmarthen area. The work will commence after Easter and we hope will be available for Autumn 2007. (Many thanks to Alan and to The Bruce Wake Trust for the funding).

We are very happy to try and assist with any enquiries concerning accessible holiday information in the UK . However please bear in mind we are an information service only and do not book holidays, in order to do this you will need to contact the providers yourselves.

Please contact us on our E-mail :- info@disabledholidayinfo.org.uk