Accessible seaside towns for older and disabled visitors

The first is the shape of the seafront. Some towns sit at the bottom of a steep hill or behind a cliff, so the walk back from the beach to the car or the hotel is the hardest part of the day. Others have a long, flat promenade at the same level as the road, with the car park, the café and the toilets all on it. That second kind of town suits an older visitor who tires quickly, even one who never sets foot on the sand, because the sea is right there from a bench.

The second is how your relative gets onto the beach, if they want to. A ramp, a boardwalk or matting laid over the sand lets them sit near the water rather than watch from the promenade, and a beach wheelchair goes further still.

A town with a level promenade and a toilet you can rely on can give your relative a good day even if the beach itself is out of reach. If your parent is still deciding what kind of trip they could manage, where to take an older person on holiday in the UK covers inland choices too.

The list is not a ranking, and it is not every accessible beach in the UK. It is the coast places where a source responsible for the access confirms what it is like. A town without a tick for toilets may well have them, so check the council's page before you set off.

Each town links to its county page, where other days out nearby, such as a garden or a museum for a wet afternoon, have the same kind of access notes. Scotland does not appear because none of the Scottish coast places in our research had their access confirmed on a council or attraction page. That is a gap in our checking, not a judgement on Scottish beaches.

Seasons, opening hours and charges change from year to year, so read the linked page for the dates you plan to visit. Some facilities are only there in summer: at Bournemouth, Boscombe and Sandbanks, for example, the beach wheelchairs are lent from May to September and the matting is laid for the summer.

Each town's card in the list above links to its scheme's page. For Cornwall, Visit Cornwall's accessibility page lists the beaches with sand chairs, and days out in Cornwall has other places with checked access. For a longer stay, accessible holidays in Cornwall covers where to base yourselves. In Northern Ireland, the Mae Murray Foundation is a charity that runs inclusive beaches with the councils.

A beach wheelchair is pushed, not self-propelled, and pushing one across soft sand is hard work. Whoever goes with your relative needs to be fit enough to do it, and two people make it far easier. Your relative also has to move from their own chair into the beach chair. Some schemes have a hoist or a stand aid for the transfer, as Exmouth does, but staff there cannot help with the hoist, so whoever is with your relative does the lifting. If your parent cannot help with a transfer, ask the scheme before you travel what is there and who can help.

Book ahead wherever the scheme allows, and have a second plan for the day in case the chair is already out. BCP Council, for example, has one chair at each of its three beach offices, lent first come, first served.

Ask the questions that matter to your relative before you pay a deposit, and ask for photographs of the bathroom and the entrance. A ground floor room with a walk-in shower may suit someone who walks with a stick but not someone who needs a hoist. A cottage that looks close to the sea on a map can be at the top of a steep street.

Three organisations help with the detail. Tourism for All is a charity that gives information on accessible accommodation and travel. AccessAble publishes detailed access guides to venues. Euan's Guide collects reviews of venues by disabled people and their families. None of them replaces a phone call to the place itself.

If your relative needs help getting washed and dressed, the room has to work for whoever is helping too, with space beside the bed and a shower they can reach. Holidays as a disabled person in the UK covers specialist holiday providers that offer adapted rooms and care on site.

If you are going by train, Passenger Assist lets you book help through the stations and onto and off the train, and National Rail advises booking as far ahead as you can. If you are driving, find the Blue Badge bays on the council's page before you leave.

The day below is an example built around one long rest and two short outings. Change the times to suit your parent, but keep the shape: the toilet first, short stretches of promenade, and home before they are exhausted.

If your relative has dementia, a crowded beach, loud arcades and changing light can be unsettling, and a quieter town or a weekday outside the school holidays may suit better. Dementia-friendly holidays and should someone with dementia go on holiday? cover how to plan around the condition. If walking is the worry, choosing a walking aid explains what suits a longer day out.

The Blue Badge figures and rules are from GOV.UK's Blue Badge application page and its guidance on Blue Badge rights and responsibilities in England. The badge belongs to your relative rather than to a car, so it can go in a carer's car too. Using it when your relative is not with you is a criminal offence, even for an errand on their behalf. If you are going abroad, using a Blue Badge abroad explains where it is recognised.

A RADAR key is sold by Disability Rights UK, and the toilets that take it are in shopping centres, pubs, cafés and stations as well as on seafronts. For Changing Places toilets, the Changing Places map shows each one with its location, and it is worth checking before you choose between two towns.

The holiday carers guide explains how this works. A carer who already visits your relative may be willing to travel with you, and taking a live-in carer on holiday covers a carer who stays for a longer trip, with their rest and their room. Every carer on PrimeCarers is self-employed, and the arrangement for the trip is between your family and the carer.

There is no published price for a holiday carer, because no two trips are alike: a weekend in a seafront hotel an hour from home is not the same as a week in a cottage at the other end of the country. Tell us the dates, the town you have in mind and what help your relative needs, and you will know the price for the carer before anything is booked. Can you take a carer on holiday with you? has a full list of what to agree with the carer, including their hours each day and their breaks. If your relative receives Attendance Allowance, they can spend it as they choose, including on a carer for a trip.

Talk to the carer about the weather before you go. Agree beforehand whether a wet day can become a visit to a museum or a garden instead, and ask what happens if the trip has to be cancelled before you agree the price.