Daytona Beach, Florida

These notes aim to provide guidance for handicapped, disabled or wheelchair users who travel to Daytona Beach, Florida. These informal notes are from a trip I took there with my wife.We stopped overnight en-route from the Everglades National Park to Savannah, Georgia.

Daytona Beach
Daytona beach is a long and beautiful beach, famous for car racing amongst other things. It is of great interest to a wheelchair user since it is the only beach, in my experience, that is hard enough to support an ordinary street wheelchair with only a moderate pushing effort. My chair is has narrow high pressure wheels (20mm) with a 3˚ camber and I was able to navigate the sand easily enough. I did need help from time to time. Especially beware of the occasional stream of water that flows down the beach into the sea – if you stop for even a second the sand will be swept from beneath your wheels and you will be embedded. However, this just adds to the fun of a day by the sea if you’ve got someone to haul you out!

Access to the beach is easy, with several streets leading straight onto the sand. These are well signposted as many people like to take their cars onto the sand for a drive.

There are beach wheelchairs available from the life guards. You will have to go to one of the lifeguard centers to get one. They are free, but I think they take a deposit when you take one out. We did not try them, since it was too far to go to the life guard centre and we are lazy!

Places to stay and eat
This is a popular holiday resort and the usual selection of chain hotels are here. We stayed in a Holiday Inn which, although old and in need of refurbishment, was perfectly fine in terms of accessibility.

There are several million food places along the strip by the ocean and although you might be disappointed if you are looking for gourmet food, you won’t starve.

Near the Holiday Inn is a drive-in worship centre where you can partake of Sunday service without leaving your car – the first time I have ever seen such a place!