Yesterday we had a day out at Chessington. We’ve had mixed experiences of days out at various places in the past, so the bar is set fairly low. Chessington scored high early on, for us, yesterday with their sensible arrangements for families with disabled children.

Once you’ve provided paper proof that your child is disabled (yes really) alongside the child, you get given a card which allows you to go to the exit of each ride. A staff member lets you straight on the ride after writing down what time you can next use the card for a big ride (adding the equivalent of the queue time you’ve jumped).

This works well as you don’t have to walk past the glares and stares of the main queue, who have you pegged as liggers as your child “don’t look disabled”, and the time delay between being able to access big rides is fair enough. A good example of reasonable adjustment really, removing the difficult bit (queuing) for dudes like LB.

We started with the Rattlesnake. My first ever roller coaster. Tom and Rich in front, waving their arms in the air. Me and LB behind. I kept my eyes scrunched shut, gripping the handlebars and quietly whimpering.  LB sat quiet, composed and distant, seemingly oblivious to height, speed, excitement or terror.

“Fuck that,” he said to himself when we got off 90 seconds later.