At Wild Water Kingdom

Ah yes! This was so many years ago, when I first went to Wild Water Kingdom with my friend Gabriella and her nephew, Rick. What a day for me and one that I shall never forget.

The day was one of the warmest of that summer and as the sun blazed down on us, I took in all of my surroundings. In those days I had enough vision to appreciate my surroundings, all of the colors and shapes and sights and sounds to go along. I was literally blown away! The various colors of people's clothes. The various shapes of their bodies. The stalls loaded with food and the kids literally bowling over each other to get to the various water rides and pools.

Gabriella took Rick and me to the lazy river, the wading pool, and some of the various other rides. Rick wore a bright yellow hat and this made it easy for me to find him. We had so much fun, and at the end of it all I returned home having enjoyed another side of life! One where I got to be a kid once more for a few hours and one where I could see enough to enjoy the big world with all of its shapes and colors.

These memories shall be forever tucked away in my memory bank and at any given time, I can recall them and cherish them.

I'm Donna J. Jodhan, your friendly accessibility advocate, wishing you a terrific day.

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Is Disney Land Blind Friendly?

   

 

A few months ago I had the good fortune to spend a day at Disney Land and for the most part I had a great time.  All because I went there with a sighted friend who was so great in helping me to find my way around.  Disney Land was packed with both adults and kids and for the most part my friend and I had to push our way through throngs of persons to get to where we wanted to go.  Just like anyone else that day.

 

I am not going to single out Disney Land in any way but I will say that based on some of the other amusement parks that I have visited, Disney Land is probably no better than others when it comes to being blind friendly.  As a general rule of thumb, most personnel at amusement parks will do their best to help out if you as a blind person have a problem but when it comes to making rides and pathways and sidewalks accessible, then here is where there are challenges and amusement parks in general fall a bit short.

 

What could amusement parks do to be a bit more blind friendly?  Provide alternate equivalents of any printed documents; in Braille, large print, and on CD or diskette.  Make pathways and sidewalks more accessible to blind persons.  Provide more ramps.  Provide audio descriptive videos shown at amusement parks; the equivalent of the regular videos shown.   There is more to be considered but for now I think that this would be an excellent start.

 

I'm Donna J. Jodhan your friendly accessibility advocate wishing you a terrific day and urging you to go out there and help to educate amusement and entertainment parks about how they can become more accessible to blind persons.  If you would like to learn more about descriptive videos, then please visit www.wgbh.org.