I realise that title may be a bit confusing when you read this post. Their wheelchair lift wasn't working at the time and their toilets were up five steps which I had to walk up...with help! Ok, maybe I should just tell the story as you're now thinking I'm just lazy and can actually walk fine.
What Happened...
It was just after three o'clock and we'd just finished Christmas festivities including lunch and secret santa at Headway. If you're wondering I got two MASSIVE bags of sweets - thanks Eric. Oh, I mean secret santa... whoever you are. A few of us decided we didn't want to go home yet and as we were in the vicinity of several pubs, it would be rude not to have a few festive Guinesses.It was suggested we go to the Lamb but I soon torpedoed that idea as it's main entrance was up a large step. The side entrance had a portable ramp up to a door that was barely wide enough to fit my wheelchair through. I knew without going in that this was a pub that had done the bare minimum to tick the 'wheelchair accessible' box.
Hogarths
Tony suggested Hogarths as it had a sign outside that says wheelchair access.
I immediately untensed.
I've stopped asking if there is a disabled toilet in pubs and restaurants as just about everywhere has them nowadays, but I can't help but stress about it until I know for sure.
I transferred from my wheelchair to a bench seat and proceeded to get 'merry'. Unfortunately, I'm a middle aged man and the effects of the Guinness hit me sooner than I expected. I got into my wheelchair and Kim helped me into the wheelchair lift. She was probably still experiencing PTSD from our coffee a few weeks previous. And I'm sure she wasn't surprised that I couldn't get the lift to work. Her natural assumption was that I was doing something wrong - which was highly likely. Try as she might, it wouldn't budge though. We called the manager over who couldn't get it working either. He said it was quite temperamental and in the new year he wanted to remove it in favour of a good ol' fashioned ramp. He was very apologetic and said
"it's not going to work I'm afraid."
I looked at my not quite finished pint - I told you, I'm getting old. I can't even finish a pint without a pit stop.
I don't like not finishing a pint and all that stood in my way was five steps.
"It's only a few steps, there's a bannister I can hold on to with my right hand. If you can support me on my left side, I think I can climb them."
"Sure no problem."
I wheeled over to the steps, grabbed the bannister and hauled myself up to standing and with my left arm being held walked up the five steps. I stood at the top waiting for my wheelchair to be put behind me with a smug grin on my face, like I'd just conquered Everest.
TOILET watch
The room was quite small. I say small, I interpret a bathroom as small if their isn't room to put my chair side on to the toilet. I appreciate this isn't something most other people would be concerned with. But it means I can retract one of my wheelchair arms and transfer easily onto the toilet. There wasn't enough room to do anything but roll up to the toilet and then roll backwards to return to the pub. It was a perfectly useable disabled toilet though. There were grab rails and the sink and hand dryer were at a suitable height. It was locked with a lock that could be opened by a radio key.
Hogarths 4/5:
I used the facilities and then called the manager over to help me back down. I descended Everest and returned to the remains of my pint.
We remained here for the next four hours and I went to the loo after every pint. There were a couple of guys sat at the top of stairs who made it there job to help me... repeatedly. As you're aware I don't tend to walk nowadays and when I do I heavily lean on the person helping me. Considering I was getting drunker and drunker everytime I returned to climb Everest, I was probably leaning quite heavily on this stranger. He didn't seem to mind though and when he left told me any of the others will help me.
DRINKING ESTABLISHMENT watch
I liked it here and will go again. They treated me the same as any other paying customer not as a requirement they had to fulfil. The fact that they had acknowledged this was a problem, hoped to change it in the near future and actually thanked me for my understanding. This attitude is one that I don't always receive and too often I get a simple 'sorry'.
Hogarths 4/5:
The next drinking establishment I visited only had upstairs toilets. I had to go to a nearby establishment to use their disabled toilet.
More on that next time...
@fatpigeonsbook