'I love the sense of freedom': an accessible adventure in North Yorkshire

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'I love the sense of freedom': an accessible adventure in North ... The Guardian

We road-test a new project aiming to make the North York Moors national park easier to explore for people with a range of mobility and sensory needs.

It’s a bright autumn morning in Dalby Forest and the light is casting dappled patterns on the leaf-covered ground as my sister Lisa whizzes past on her bike. I catch her up and we stop to take in the view and debate which way to head next.

Nothing particularly unusual in this, perhaps, except Lisa has been a wheelchair user for almost 10 years after a spinal cord injury left her paralysed from the waist down, and this is the first time we’ve properly been out and about in nature since.

Thanks to an adapted e-bike from Dalby Forest Cycle Hub we’re able to spend a morning cycling on trails that wind through the 3,200-hectare (8,000-acre) woodland, with the hub’s owner, Rob Brown, as our guide.

We’d come to North Yorkshire to see how possible an outdoor adventure might be, testing out the work of the newly launched North York Moors national park accessibility project. Eight attractions and four accommodation providers in the area have worked with Visit England to develop access and provide disability awareness training for staff. While Lisa’s disability affects her mobility, the project caters for a range of needs, from autism to sensory impairments.

“We want to make the national park as accessible as it can be for people with differing needs,” said project manager Rachel Gillis. “We chose organisations that were already working on accessibility and were keen to do more. We looked at what was going well, and what wasn’t, and helped with development plans, accessibility guides, training and some funding. It’s a pilot project we hope to roll out across the country.”

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