I’m an adventurer at heart. I’ve always liked to push my comfort zone, feel the fear and ride the adrenaline! In more recent years I’ve become an ardent disability advocate and campaigner.
I believe by challenging myself, encouraging disabled people to go for their dreams and to educate society on my difficult daily challenges and personal abilities: I have a new, modern, powerful and impacting method for social change.
My everyday blogs shows my adventures with my family in Cambridge, my media adventures in London and my extreme actions further afield (SCUBA diving, flying planes, and world travel are just a few).
However this area of my website highlights my more extreme, difficult and world changing journeys.
Epic European Disability Roadtrip
When I was 22 I saved up, researched, planned and booked my first independent trip, to Australia! It required 2 PAs, extra care budget, hoists and major will power. After that, I finished my degree in economics, masters in marketing, learnt to drive, lived with care support independently in London, worked at the disability charity Scope, left to start my own business and travelled many more times.
By 2012, I was ready for another exciting project, travelling through Lithuania, Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, Belgium and France.
In Vilnius, Lithuania
Read more about my epic European Roadtrip…
Viva Espana!
It has been pointed out that I often overlook the magnitude of a challenge I have overcome. I generally have an idea or a life dream, analyse the barriers in the way, set about finding solutions and work until I get there. This often involves thinking out of the box with disability related barriers, and pestering certain people to help.
Spain was very much a ‘lifelong’ dream, with huge barriers and it took ages to make it possible. Everyone has life dreams, I do believe everything is possible, but it can take what feels like forever. You just have to give it a go and stick at it!
In Aviles, I was teaching, delivering talks, running my own radio show and learning Spanish.
Read more about my Viva Espana! trip…
Polish Dignity and Equality
On the polish leg of my Epic European Disability Roadtrip (see above) I met Boguslaw and Teresa. I learned about life in Poland with a disability: the lack of funding, lack of equipment, lack of care, their basic government disability policy and the negative attitudes of society.
Boguslaw was a national and international speedway champion. After an accident, he uses a wheelchair and is now invisible to his previously adoring public. He and Teresa shared with me their plan to ride around their country by wheelchair to raise awareness and to demand change – called ‘Dignity and Equality’, covering 2500 kilometres, all by wheelchair – and asked me to get involved. And of course, I did!
Read more about my Polish Dignity and Equality trip…
What disAbility? John O’Groats Trek
Having seen a large part of the world by train, plane and automobile (and Europe together with Filipe Roldao in my adapted car for the Epic European Disability Roadtrip); it was time to do something super silly! Kasia and I decided to travel approximately 1100 miles from John o Groats (furthest northern point of Scotland) to Lands End (furthest southern point of England).
Read more about our trek here…
Japan: a life changing visit
I was invited to Japan as part of an exchange programme for people working in the Not-for-Profit (NPO) sectors, to share and learn best practice. This was organised by the International Youth Exchange Organisation (IYEO) and the Cabinet Office of Japan.
Read more about my life-changing visit to Japan…
Europe Without Barriers
In June 2014 Ivor Ambrose from the European Network for Accessible Tourism (ENAT) kindly invited me to speak in Brussels for a conference on accessible tourism. It was great to meet the living legend in person, and connect with a community of like minded people.
Then in early 2015, as Kasia and I were planning our month in Barcelona, Ivor introduced me to Marco Pizzio from the Italian Multiple Sclerosis charity (AISM). They were coordinating a pilot project with the European Commission called Europe Without Barriers. We were asked to join the project.
For two weeks, a selected group of participants from all over Europe (and from different accessible tourism professions) went to 5 European countries, 4 hotels, and multiple tourist attractions.
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