after dithering for months finally bought a travel scoot, a lightweight mobility scooter that folds up like a babies buggy and fits in the boot of my car. It folds really easily and weighs approx 32 lbs.
it sat in my hall for a week, I could not quite get my head around the fact I needed to use this at 50 years of age to do normal family outings.
today we took the children to the zoo, out first proper family outing in a year. When we took it out of the car I felt so self conscious I wanted to go back home. I couldn’t disappoint the children who were so excited that I was actually out with them ( normally my husband does the park etc with them) so on I got and off I went.
it was fantastic, we were 6 hours in the zoo, the kids had a great time, I didn’t get too many people looking at me. Better still when we got home I wasn’t dropping with fatigue.
I felt very self conscious on mine at first… but once you get over that isn’t it fantastic!
You become ‘enabled’ instead of ‘disabled’.
Your life will change from now on!
One thing which I didn’t understand when I first had mine… When I went shopping I tried to get it into every shop with great difficulty. Then I caught onto the fact that you leave them outside small shops!
Get yourself a folding walking stick and always take it with you so you can get off the scooter. It’s worthwhile having it insured as well. There are lots of companies who insure scooters. Mine is called ‘Premium’.
I love my scooter! There are several places I’ve been to visit (including Chester zoo) where scooters are available to borrow. Booking one just gbecomes part of the forward planning people like us have to do. It also gives us a degree of spontaneity, especially if its all charged up and ready to go-in my case two steps outside the front door.
The small shops can be tricky. If you can use a stick that’s good but I tend to just catch someone’s attention from outside or even ring them as I sit waiting. Most people are really helpful. Funny enough I had more of a thing about going out with a stick for the first time.
Anyone recommend makes? I want a light easy to transport one, pref one I could take to visit son and family in Australia. So many seem heavy even when supposed to be travel scooters.
Hi Lynda, there are so many on the market now it’s hard to know which is best. The ‘Luggie’ is very popular & was one of the first ones that folds down into a suitcase on wheels.
I would suggest you look on sites that have reviews. Also, if price is an issue, look on eBay. Scooters are often sold second-hand and some have hardly been used.
If you put ‘folding mobility scooter’ into google you’ll get masses of links for new ones.
Remember to sign the form to get the VAT taken off.
TGA - mobility scooters are good. They make several folding ones - and a great choice of bigger bolder ones. And they do have second-hand ones sometimes. All reasonable price.
Thanks everyone, I can’t believe how happy I am, it’s like regaining some mobility. I am looking forward to next weekend already. My little boy who is 5 keeps saying we had a great day yesterday. Anyone who is debating about getting one, don’t just do it.
Thanks for input on scooters. I have read so many online reviews and everyone thinks their own one is great, so first hand experience is welcome. Have you noticed, that when travel scooters are demo-d in adverts, they are done by fit, mobile able bodied types? Why not show somebody with restricted mobility and bad balance loading and assembling? There is one on YouTube though of a young buy with MS loading a luggie. The luggie supplier in the UK comes to the house to do a demo but I expect it will then be a hard sell.