Key Takeaways
- The ability to see all the beauty in the world — from a sunset over the mountains to the mist of the cloud forest to the crystal blue waters of Thaila
- Personally, I’ve always wondered what would happen if I were to lose the ability to see it. Would I have the fortitude to carry on? How would I adapt?
- A few months ago, I received an email from a reader named Tyler, telling me about how he travels with his friend Dan, who is legally blind (he suffers
The ability to see all the beauty in the world — from a sunset over the mountains to the mist of the cloud forest to the crystal blue waters of Thailand — is something we often take for granted.
Personally, I’ve always wondered what would happen if I were to lose the ability to see it. Would I have the fortitude to carry on? How would I adapt? I mean, I’ve never even sprained a finger!
A few months ago, we received an email from a reader named Tyler, telling us about how he travels with his friend Dan, who is legally blind (he lives with extremely low vision). We were immediately inspired by Dan’s story. Born sighted, he began losing vision in his teens but adapted without letting it limit his wanderlust.
The more Dan, Tyler, and we talked, the more we knew this story had to be shared on Route for Less. Though we recognize the irony in sharing a text-based interview about traveling blind, here is Dan’s inspiring journey — and some deeply thoughtful advice for travelers of all abilities.
Route for Less: Hi Dan! Thanks for doing this! Tell us about yourself!
Dan: I’m 31, from Nobleton, Canada. I started going blind when I was a toddler. A family friend noticed that I was sitting abnormally close to the TV, desperately trying to look at all the awesome planes in Top Gun. I ended up getting a prescription for absurdly thick corrective lenses like Mr. Magoo.
When I was seven, I was kicked in the back of the head by accident by a friend of mine and ended up with a detached retina, leaving me blind in my left eye.
In 2008, the vision in my right eye started to go red. I was told that my right eye’s retina was coming off. For the most part, the surgery to repair the tear was a success, but the scar tissue wasn’t healing properly. I had two more operations over the next two years, but the recovery process was slow.
For a large chunk of that time I was totally blind. At first, I was incredibly light-sensitive. It wasn’t until much later I was able to regain some, mostly blurry vision — but with the added bonus of retinal scar damage!
After recovery and a long fight with depression over losing my vision, I realized that I had a choice: adapt or stagnate. I chose to adapt, better myself, and to just keep moving forward.
What it’s like to live a life with a vision disability?
For me, living with a disability is something I’m almost used to, though there are always challenges. For example, my only big requests for my former housemates were to keep cupboard doors shut, not leave knives in the sink (I’d prefer to keep all of my fingers), and not leave anything on the floor that wasn’t there before.
It’s really the little things that are difficult, and that can honestly be embarrassing. With low vision, you quickly learn to mistrust anything made of glass, specifically glass doors. Who knows where they are, if they’re open, or even if they exist at all!
Many public and private buildings and services simply aren’t accessible by their nature. One case being train stations: I can’t see the board with the arrival/departure times, or the platforms. Usually, there is assistance available but my pride and independence mean I try my hardest to navigate situations myself.
I use an iPhone to take a photo of the train times and zoom in on it, letting me move at my own pace. Using a small, high-resolution screen lets me have a better look at the world around me without having to get within inches of the subject.
What fuels your passion for travel?
My passion for travel comes from my family. Both of my parents are nomadic at heart. My father traveled all over the world in his youth for various reasons, eventually leaving his native France to come to Canada.
My mother is a brilliantly independent woman who travels across Canada and beyond, speaking on behalf of the Lions Foundation of Canada, an organization that provides dog guides to people with a wide range of disabilities, not just the blind.
In fact, she’s totally blind and travels with a dog guide herself. Our disabilities aren’t really connected on a hereditary level. She’s been totally blind since before I was born, and has worked with dog guides since 1989. She’s a huge inspiration to me and a major part of why I do my blog and YouTube channel.
Beyond family, I travel for the people. You can’t walk through a hostel without a happy Australian sticking their hand out with a “how’re ya goin’?” I realized people are genuinely curious about my vision, my cane, and my travels. I feed off of their curiosity, and I love being in a position to tell stories. I just love learning about how the person across from me got to be across from me.
What challenges did you face traveling with low vision? Were some countries easier to travel in than others?
Luckily for me, Europe (where I mostly travel) tends to be fairly accessible. While it’s nearly impossible to retrofit a thousand-year-old church with accessible ramps and touch tours, to their credit, most have usually made some sort of effort.
Sometimes it’s as simple as a large-print or braille guidebook, or sometimes you’ll have a full-blown exhibit in which people can feel the objects on display.
When I first started traveling back in 2012, I had the most difficulty in Barcelona. I was still learning how to work with abnormal street crossings. Anyone who has been there can attest that, for better or worse, their intersections don’t follow predictable patterns — making navigation tricky without visual cues.
