Keroul - Wednesday 28th April

Back to work....I spent the day with Andre leCLerc and his team at Keroul in Montreal today. What a great day. This organisation is doing a number of the things that we can see IDEAS doing....we can learn a lot from them. Keroul have specialised in supporting accessible tourism for people with disability in Quebec for 30 years and have a wealth of experience and knowledge. I spent time with the executive team, Research and Development team as well as peopel working on their Äccessible Road project. The dedicated staff of 8 people were wonderful hosts and I can't thank them enough for their time. I came away from the day armed with a mountain of papers, reports and tools to research and review as well as a genuine hockey puck. Great ambassadors for Quebec; it was so nice to connect with colleagues in our field.I will meet again with people from Keroul at the Transed Conference in Hong Kong. www.keroul.qc.ca if you would like to see what they do or www.larouteaccessible.com which is another of their websites.

Saturday 24th April

Now we have moved onto Phoenix and staying with an American girlfriend that I spent time with at High School in Tumut. Veva and her husband Steve live in Paradise Valley near Phoenix Arizona. the pace is less stressful than Houston and the countryside is a beautiful desert. I feel much more relaxed in this environment and it is a nice break from the hectic cities we have had to date.

Wednesday 21st April

Late yesterday I was able to attend a presentation by Mr Bernard Lane an internationally renowned expert on rural tourism and sustainable tourism. He is founder and co-editor of the Journal of Sustainable Tourism. His presentation at TAMU was very interesting, while not specifically about the "easy access" tourism market parallels could be drawn. As a resident of Tumut, NSW I could see some parallels with our community and the examples Mr Lane was describing from his work in the UK. A great opportunity which I wouldn't have had without this fellowship.

Today I had the privilege of talking with some Parks, Recreation and Tourism students at TAMU who were embarking on their Diversity unit. It was an interesting experience for me and I hope so for them. I would like to thank Professor David Scott for the opportunity and hope that I left his students with some new knowledge to consider.

Tuesday 20th April

Today I met with Ulrike Gretzel Assistant Professor and Director Laboratory for Intelligent Systems in Tourism Dept. of Recreation, Park and Tourism Sciences Texas A&M University. I spent two full hours discussing the pros and cons of online social marketing and the effect it can have on travelling for people with disability. Our conversation was very engaging and gave a good insight into some directions we need to look at for the online provision of information and engaging with both individuals travelling and the tourism business sector. Fitting very neatly with our mission to allow people with dsiability to make informed choices leads to providing a platform where they can give feedback and inform others of what they have found works for them and what hasn't. This in turn can be very good feedback for the business sector involved as they can learn what they can do to improve and meet this market as well as receive feedback on what they are doing well. I learned a lot more from Ulrike and look forward to more conversations with her in the future.

San Francisco- tuesday April 13th

Yesterday I had a conversation with Scott Rains which was very informative. He is a fellow to keep in touch with and one who has a good understanding of what is happening at the moment in the accessible travel field. He is a very good networker and has names at the tip of his tongue, which has been of great assistance for me in planning the UK leg of this trip. His experience and knowledge of the different operators, experts and opportunities in the field are very valuable. The time spent with him was worthwhile indeed. I hope to be in touch with him again in the near future.

Today I met with Bonnie Lewkowicz from Access Northern California to discuss her experiences. Bonnie is leading activist and a great advocate for people with disability. Bonnie leads a small no profit which has developed access guides for the Northern California region as well as the San Francisco access guide. This was a nice introduction into the workings of the disability advocacy sector in the USA. Bonnie has a good handle on how things work and where things are at. We discussed the issues of maintaining information, its accuracy and reliability. My conversation with Bonnie was the first to see how similar the issues are in the US to those we have at home. The problems of collecting accurate information and maintaining it – the resources needed and the funding for it I don’t think are any different to our experiences in Australia.

For those after some travelogue information – the weather ahs been cold and wet, the tourist sites being visited are the iconic sites and information is being collected on the accessibility of these sites for future use by IDEAS NSW.

Now on to New York…

Planning, planning, planning

The planning phase is now well and truly on. Itineraries are starting to be finalised with confirmation of meetings beginning to come in. With just under three months until we leave, the countdown is well and truly on.....