My travels as a wheelchair user.

Hi all,

I’ve just returned from Japan, I spent two weeks there with family. 5 nights in Osaka, 3 in Kanazawa and the remainder in Tokyo.

Overall, I enjoyed it but was also disappointed from a foodie point of view due to lack of access. It was nice to be given priority to lifts, you get treated with some respect and not just thrown to the side. People didn’t really stare, other than curious kids. Bathrooms were always clean and didn’t run into the issue of having to wait to enter, able bodied people didn’t use them unlike every other country I’ve been in so far and had to wait for them to walk out. Gloves would be recommended if you’re pushing a lot, your hands get dirty pretty quick but not as bad as London streets (they make your hands really filthy). Never had an issue where lifts were broken down or out of service.

Would I return? Yes, especially since there was a lot I didn’t get to see.

Recommend it? If you want to go mainly for site seeing, yes. For a food experience, nope.

Helpfulness? Everyone was helpful, especially when I needed help onto a train.

Accessible hotels? I booked it during peak season so I had no choice but to get what I was given, I left it too long and a lot of places were fully booked. I’ll probably book Daiwa Roynet for future travels in Japan.

Osaka (including Nara & Hiroshima):
– Stayed within umeda area, it was busy every night but it wasn’t too hard to traverse and get around people.
– Stayed at Ibis, the bathroom door was too small for my commode to pass through but room had a lot of space.
– Couldn’t find a lot of restaurants to get into that didn’t have steps.

Kanazawa :
– Nothing like Osaka with tourists or being busy. Everything was flat and easy to get around on the roads.
– Stayed at Daiwa Roynet, by far one of the better universal rooms, spacious and easy enough to get around with a wheelchair and commode.
– Restaurants still weren’t too accessible, there were the ones within the shopping centers which are easy enough to access due to flat entrance

Tokyo :
– Busy like Osaka but still easy enough to get around, outside of peak hour.
– Stayed at a Sotetsu hotel, bathroom was awful. For a universal room, I couldn’t reach the shower (had to have a sponge bath)and it lacked a roll in shower, plus didn’t have hot water from the hand held shower head.
– A lot more restaurants around that had ramps for access but the doors were narrow leaving me unable to enter. Surrounding wards had pretty much the same issue but a lot of places turned away other tourists while we were allowed in (not sure if they felt sorry for me being in a chair)

by KronicalA