Huddersfield - Saying Goodbye to a Much Loved Friend

 

Bright yellow sunflower bathed in sunlight -all images the same.

Recently, it was a good friends life celebration service. She died to a similar condition that I have. Sunflowers were her favourite💛💚

When my mum phoned up the assistance, I think we confused him, because we had three trips on different days to book.  The first was Liverpool to Huddersfield. I think this was a TransPennine train. The journey was fine, they had a voice over to announce each stop, and a bell alerted passengers to the approach of a station.

Huddersfield station was a new one to us. It’s quite a nice, small station, from what I saw of it, like Liverpool Lime Street train station. It had a lift to get you up to the concourse from the platform. To exit the station there’s a stairway and a ramp. To get from the platform to exit, we had to go up and down in a lift.

As we didn't know the area, we decided to get a taxi. We saw a Hackney, the only accessible cab, but as we went over, it was empty. So, we followed my mums phone directions, which led us to a shop. Thankfully the woman here pointed us in the right direction.

The Cambridge Hotel had said, when we phoned up to enquire about the accessible rooms, that they had a family room that a wheelchair could turn in, but no specific disabled rooms, as we were only staying for one night we agreed to book. It was odd that they didn’t have specific disabled rooms because when we arrived the entrance was good. It had a zigzag shaped ramp going up to the foyer. The foyer, although not huge, did have a fan, which on the hottest day of the year, was delightful. The receptionist was friendly and helpful.

The lift, on first appearances, looked small, but when it opened, was a decent size. It had a voice over to announce the floors. I don't know if the buttons had braille.

Finding the room was a bit tricky, like entering a maze.

In truth, it really was not an accessible room at all. We had to move furniture, such as the bed and a randomly placed chair. The awkward wardrobe in the middle of a wall made turning the wheelchair hard.

To navigate the tiny bathroom, I had to have the door wide open, so I could use the door handle as a bar. My mum had to help me from the toilet to the sink.

The restaurant/breakfast room was ok. My wheelchair fitted in the table with ease. The staff were lovely and accommodated my dietary requirements. We were impressed that all the food was home cooked and had generous portions.

My only suggestion to the Cambridge Hotel is that they sort out their accessible rooms.

They can do this by:

* Moving the wardrobe to the far corner, and thus allowing wheelchair turning space.

* An accessible bathroom.

I have to say that the staff here were lovely.

Something that surprised me in Huddersfield was that out of the four taxi firms we phoned, only one had a wheelchair accessible car! I find this disgraceful and three of the companies may be breaking the Equality Act 2010 as they are effectively refusing disabled passengers.

The car that took us to the crematorium was nice. It was bright, high and secure.

Parkwood crematorium was lovely. It was surrounded by countryside. As it was a roasting hot day, we were glad of the shelter that hung over the entrance, as it provided coolness. The access here was brilliant, with flat, wide doorways and movable chairs for the service, rather than stone pews.

Something my mum and I liked about it here, was, you went in one door and out a back door, where you could pay respects to the family without meeting the next broken-hearted family.

It really was a joyful service to honour a tremendous girl, my friend, Laura, who I miss.