Disability Advocates

We caught up with TravelAbility Summit Board member and travel expert John Sage, whose company offers fully-vetted, accessible vacations in 45 countries. Read his expert answers, below:

Q: Your disability occurred during a snow skiing accident around 2000 when you were 22. How and when did you decide to use your disability to help others travel?

A: Despite my T-4 Spinal cord injury at age 22, I decided to embark on several European travel adventures during my twenties. Each trip was very time consuming to plan because I needed to make sure that my accessibility needs were met throughout. I discovered first-hand the numerous accessible travel challenges and lack of resources to overcome them.

In 2008, I planned a trip for six of my friends and afterwards, they told me “You should write a book. You should be the disabled Rick Steves.” Instead, after some time exploring my options, I started an accessible travel website with the plan to make money advertising. This effort didn’t work out the way I wanted it to but it did inspire me to start a travel business dedicated to people with disabilities.  There was a huge need for accessible travel expertise and services and my company has grown fast.

Q: As an entrepreneur, you have multiple divisions, how did that come about? 

A: Several years ago, I attended the Cruise3sixty travel conference and I was looking forward to visiting the booth of whoever the leading accessible tour operator was. I was surprised to see that there was none. Following this, I decided to start a second company called Accessible Travel Solutions, a B2B company working with travel agencies, cruise lines, OTA’s, and other businesses. We took our most popular, accessible travel services and offered them through this brand. We have had a lot of success helping big and small businesses add accessible travel options to their offerings. In 2016, Accessible Travel Solutions won Travel Weekly’s “Tour Operator of the Year” Award.

Q: Your website states that you have accessible travel options in 50 countries, are these mostly cruise-type shore excursions?

A: While a big part of what we do is to provide accessible shore excursions to the cruise line industry, we offer much more than that! With Sage Traveling, Accessible Caribbean Vacations, and Accessible Travel Solutions you can book everything from accessible guided tours, accessible shore excursions, accessible transfers, accessible travel packages and accessible escorted group trips. The majority of our destinations are in Europe and the Caribbean but we are also currently conducting research and working on adding destinations such as Alaska and New Zealand.

I’ve personally been to most of the destinations in my manual wheelchair to evaluate things like sidewalk ramps, accessible bathrooms, entrances of museums, churches, castles, palaces, forts, accessible hotel rooms, and trains. My team and I work with our local partners to design and execute accessible tour itineraries that are reliable and enjoyable. We have reservations agents in 3 countries who provide pre-trip consulting, handle all the trip details, and provide 24/7 emergency assistance. This team is focused 100% on accessible travel.

Q: You have said that accessibility means different things in different countries. Any tips on the most accessible European cities? Or cautionary tales?

A: Here are three articles I wrote several articles these topics, which are available on my website, sagetraveling.com, including The 3 Most Wheelchair Accessible Cities in Europe, The Top 10 Europe Handicapped Travel Tips and 25 Things That Can Go Wrong Traveling With a Disability. 

Q: Do cruise lines understand the importance of accessibility in shore excursions?

A: In the past, the issue was that most of their local tour operators didn’t have the accessibility knowledge and experience to design and execute accessible tours. They would ask their local tour operators to offer accessible tours, and the local operator would either say ‘no’ or they would take their shortest simplest tour, add a bus with a wheelchair lift and drive people around for 2 hours without getting out of the bus (which is not the vacation experience most people are looking for).

When I meet with the cruise lines and tell them we can be a single point of contact providing fully-accessible vetted tours in 90+ ports, they are relieved because it’s something they wanted to provide but weren’t sure how to tackle. Our tours are not “window” tours where people simply see a destination from onboard a bus. Our tours are actual experiences where travelers get to enjoy incredible sites and unique visits firsthand. Some of the most popular experiences we offer include the Sistine Chapel in Rome, the Pompeii Ruins in Naples, La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, the Louvre Museum in Paris, San Cristobal Fort in San Juan, the Monkey Sanctuary in Roatan, the Diamond Waterfall in St. Lucia, and many more.

Q: How do you vet all of these shore excursion itineraries? Did you have someone in a wheelchair actually conduct the research in each destination?

A: Unfortunately, one cannot simply rely on something being accessible just because the internet says so. Much information is outdated or simply inaccurate.