At stations and airports, ALL the Special Assistance staff are all themselves a bit ‘ special’ ( needs ).

That’s fantastic… except ffs you try asking ANY of them to do anything other than EXACTLY the thing they always do and there is total confusion.
I’m all for equal opportunities but seriously, people who need assistance could actually benefit from someone with an iota of lateral thinking.
It’s proper Documentary / Gogglebox stuff, every bloody journey!

Well that’s a first. Another close shave with calamity.

I came to Portugal ( having considered every single possible mishap over and over again- like I just have to .. ) and when I got here, and after they’d damaged my wheelchair in transit, I then went on the dual carriageway to my wee apartment here… mixing it with the speeding/ hungover holiday traffic.. to find when I got there that I had no battery charger to recharge my Triride. Wtf. I’d even thought about packing a charger… but I KNEW that I had 2 here in Portugal.
Doh! They’ve obviously evaporated to nothing in the heat or just maybe I’d f***ed up and got it wrong ?!

So I now had 50% charge and a 10 mile return trip to the airport 4 days away.
Well I realised that I couldn’t risk depleting my 50% any further so I couldn’t use my Triride.
But wait! I kept an old, low power Tri in Portugal! Weyhey. After a lot of bracket changing and swearing and obviously with Gina being the least practical person in the whole world ( possibly in the whole Universe ) I got the old Triride on.
Fantastic! Until I pulled the brake lever and discovered I had NO BRAKES AT ALL. A full battery with 20 miles of possible travel .. but NO BRAKES.
Bloody hell.
Well there isn’t Amazon in Portugal so you can’t get anything the next day. You have to use Amazon Spain. Ole! I ordered a charger. 2 days it said.

So I then also looked all over the internet for e bike shops, phoned about 20 of them, to find that none of them had the charger I needed? I mean cmon?!

2 days later and we wheeled past a local bike shop. This is a small town and no one has a website… but the lovely fella diagnosed zero hydraulic fluid pressure. However he was officially on Portuguese siesta time ( most of the afternoon) so asked me to come back 3 hours later. I think my ( almost ) bursting into tears possibly helped me at that point and he syringed brake fluid in. I also said I’d pay whatever he wanted just to have a brake.
€5000 later I left with an old triride that had power AND brakes. Amazing!

Then I got a notification that Amazon was just coming to the rescue anyway, with my charger.
Then I got a notification that I wasn’t at home, despite being at home. … like you do.
Turns out that despite me allowing permission to the driver to see my EXACT location.,, they tried to deliver to somewhere else 4 miles away.

Anyway (!) today… I had to Triride in my 50% charged Tri to Faro airport. I felt the strong headwind against me as I set off northwards to Faro.
After a few miles I was already down to one bar of charge. That’s 25%. I’m on a dual carriageway and going slowly to save battery.
At less than 25% charge my MAPS tells me I’ve 4.5 miles to go, and most of it it slightly uphill.
I reckon I’ve a 1 in 10 chance of making it, with no back up rescue plan.

The battery indicator is showing NO BARS and I’ve 2 miles to go. The last half mile is uphill. I expect to break down and have to push along the hard shoulder.
Extraordinarily I get to the airport, to the waiting Gina. Literally as I get there my battery dies and won’t come back on. I had to push myself through the airport doors. Because of all my steelwork in my do spine, pushing isn’t very possible for me, hence my reliance on the Triride totally these last 6 years. The one I have needs replacement. I’ve done 10,000 miles In it. They aren’t like cars that can just keep going.
I need to replace it or it’ll just die on me one day whilst I’m in a very tricky situation ( like on a dual carriageway in the ALGARVE whilst heading for my flight check in… or something unlikely that you couldn’t make up , like that… )

Ok – so I’ve ordered new batteries ( £1300 ) and new spare chargers that I’ll keep in my attached wheelchair bag.

There’s no such thing as a dull moment in my paralysis life. Dull ( not that my life ever had been ) has been replaced with stressful as f***.

But yep, a bloody close one yet again. It could have read ‘ ran out of charge just as lorry came barrelling up behind me and got Squidged ‘

Now on a plane.
When I get to Brentford railway station, I’ll have no battery to get the half mile home. G will have to push me home. What would I do without her? For sure I give her a hard time because she’s not always the sharpest knife in the box of very blunt knives ) but blimey she’s devoted.
Or she’s just a masochist.
Or she’s just incredibly thick skinned and likes the daily dramatic life I lead.

I think there should be a Clap for Gina one night soon.
Pretty sure she won’t have ever had The Clap.

Anyway, thanks to Gina G for being there. Often next to useless, but they’re nevertheless.

She does have the odd unexpected idea. It is totally left field when she does come up with something I haven’t thought of myself… but it has happened!
Just can’t think of an example right now.

Her daughter apparently reads this diary.., Hello Emma! Thanks for loaning me your mum for a few days. You’re a teacher, I understand. It’s not immediately apparent where you got your intelligence from (😂) but I’m thinking you might wanna be extra grateful to your Dad.
But your Mum is a Saint !!

Having arrived in Portugal, I was met with the horrifying sight of my wheelchair having been mangled by the airport handlers.
A dangerous triride to my place here, me being so frazzled I went the wrong way …

Now here I have FOUR wheelchairs… and NONE OF THEM ARE OK.

Holidays are definitely consistently anything but.

Ffs

Lots of people to mention!

Thanks to my lovely ( first boss ) and great friend Damo, for coming and making me laugh for 5 hours, for Toby for his great practical wheelchair messing about with skills, Glenn for lunch out, Marky P for his ongoing devotion with an occasional pearl of wisdom chucked in, Natalie for coming to Abba Voyage ( well ok she should thank me really! ) Gina for helping me in Court ( cant do this stuff physically myself, Toby again for his advice, Kerry for her frequent 3 word messages of concern for me, to my mum for our daily chats, to Yasmine for her level headed wisdom and coffee, to Ranulph Fiennes for his bloody extraordinary talk about his life..

My lil budgie died – Fanny – now buried deep in my garden. I’ve decided to give away little Tweety to someone better able to play with her. Someone is going to get a MASSIVE cage and a weeny bird .. very soon.

Court was interesting. Best leave it there.
And we shall have to do it all again in about 5 months – last time though.
I’ve pushed and pushed for a chat and a solution, but it needs both parties to buy into that.
Legal legal legal then. Fun fun fun.