Pirates question

[Samantha Becker]

on Pirates of the carribean I understand you cannot take a wheelcahir on. Is he able take take his electric wheelcahir through the line or must he get into a manual? Also do you go through reg line or exit. Oh one more question, can he pull up wheelcahirright up beside boat to transfer or will we have to carry him over?

 

[BillSears]

You cannot take a wheelchair onto the ride and I don't think they will let you take an electric wheelchair through the queue. You will have to transfer to a manual chair to get up to the boat.

Here is a picture of the boat, I can take off my footrests and get my wheelchair right up against the side of the boat. Then I lift my legs into the boat and slide forward. Getting off I reverse it and slide back into my chair.

THe CM at the entrance really wanted me to transfer into a WDW manual chair before entering the queue but after I explained how that chair wouldn't work for me he allowed me to use my own manual chair.

Here's a great website about wheeling around WDW and they'll have some nice descriptions of the transfers.

http://www.themouseonwheels.com/

 

[Schmeck]

The loading and unloading areas of PotC are in separate buildings, so I believe the policy is to transfer the guest to a wheelchair. There are photos online depicting the best row to transfer into the ride vehicle. They may even be linked in the stickies above?

Edit to add: or wonderful Bill Sears will post and give you all the best info!

 

[SueM in MN]

Yep, Bill has a great picture and a good descrption.

Pirates at WDW has the entrance in one building on ground floor. The exit is in another building, in the basement. When you get off the boats at the exit, the boat goes up a steep ramped area with just enough clearance for the boat to get thru (no passengers). So, it's not possible to get on at the exit like it is for some other attractions.
Because the entrance and the exit are so far apart, they prefer people to switch from their own wheelchair to one of the attraction wheelchairs at the entrance to the queue. That way, they don't have to move your wheelchair from the boarding area to the exit. What they usually do is just put the 'loaner' wheelchair into the back of the boat and it travels thru the ride with you.

CMs will sometimes move a wheelchair from the boarding area to the exit, but if you do that, you take a chance that you may arrive at the exit before your wheelchair does. We did it once and it worked out, but other people have posted that they arrived at the exit and their wheelchair was not waiting for them.

Also, Bill's picture show to height of the boat side. It's kind of like transferring over the side of a bathtub and onto a bath seat about 6 inches lower than the side. If he can help you, you might be able to do it, but, it is not an easy transfer. If he can't help, keep in mind that it is much easier to lift someone in than to lift them out. My DD is only 5 feet tall and is 86 pounds, but this is one of the harder rides we put her on.

Also, the way they are loading people with wheelchairs (or were the last time we rode) you get in on the side shown on Bill's picture and off on the same side. The 'fences' that the picture shows are to separate out the groups of riders into individual rows. The back row (the one shown in the picture) has a little more room for transferring. The rows farther forward have 'fences' pretty close together.
One final thing that Bill's picture shows well is that the seat is pretty shallow. If you can't get the person all the way back in the seat and/or if they are sitting forward on their coccyx, not much of the butt is in the seat.

 

[HonnyDipp]

Thanks so much for this information! I have Polymyositis its a rare muscle disease that has taken away my abilility to walk and get up out of chairs. I'm doing better and getting stronger, but its good to know that I can still plan my trip to the World and know that I can still enjoy myself. This information is really helpful! Thanks again!