Travel blogger aims to set ‘wheel’ in every country
Anthony Tipling-Bower has climbed the steps of Angkor Wat, rode on the back of a tuk-tuk through Bangkok, and floated down the Mekong Delta in a banana boat.
They're the sorts of adventures that many travel bloggers write about - and the Newcastle native documents them all in his blog, The Geordie Traveller.
But Tipling-Bower is a travel blogger with a difference. He is on a mission to become the first wheelchair user to visit every country in the world.
"When I started my blog, I was desperate just to become a travel writer," he said. "I didn't want to be associated with some kind of disability travel writer."
That all changed when he met a couch-surfing couple from Canada who encouraged him to make the most of his unique perspective.
"We were talking about my travel writing and they said, 'Dude, you've got this niche - this thing that's different from 99.9 per cent of travellers. Just use it."
Tipling-Bower, 25, has a rare genetic disability which affects all of the joints in his body.
He writes reviews of all of the places he goes, and is working on creating an accessible travel guide for other disabled travellers.
For the past two months he has been living in Wellington, undertaking an internship with the World Wildlife Fund and checking out the capital's attractions, such as Zealandia and Te Papa.
He aims to break down disability stereotypes with the stories he shares on his blog.
"One of my greatest pleasures is going around the world and really challenging people's perceptions of what it means to be disabled," he said.
"Quite often I get people telling me, 'Oh, you can't do this' or, 'oh, you can't do that'.
"When they see me doing it, it's quite a nice feeling to see the look on their face when they realise, 'Oh wow, you can do that'."
Tipling-Bower says he doesn't see himself as "disabled" - in fact, there is nothing he cannot do.
"When I was in Vietnam, I went on a tour to the Mekong Delta and I did everything, except the final activity on the tour was to get on these really small banana boats and to float down one of the back streams.
"For two hours, the tour guide was trying to convince me it just wasn't possible to join in with this section of the tour. I just wasn't going to accept that. So I kept fighting and fighting.
"As it were, when it came to actually going on the banana boats, I was the fastest out of the tour to get to where I was supposed to be, get on the boat, carry my chair myself - do everything myself.
"I felt vindicated, in a sense."
Follow Anthony's adventures on his Facebook page, The Geordie Traveller.
Have you been to any of the locations Anthony has visited? Where’s your favourite place in the world to travel?
Please let us know in the comments below.
Written by Siobhan Downes. First appeared on Stuff.co.nz.
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