Balmoral Castle

Disabled parking right next to the shop and cafe, beautiful to come up the drive and see the castle from the car. Unfortunately scooter and wheelchair hire is only available during summer months at the moment due to staff getting used to Balmoral being open during the autumn months, hopefully soon they will have hire available!

We visited the castle along with my aunt and uncle at the end of May. We knew from previous visits to contact the castle direct about tickets for disabled and also use of one of their. Batericars . As I am a blue badge holder we had access via the main gate to park next to the gift shop . Which was ideal . Although we did encounter one issue before getting our tickets we had been told we would have a carer ticket . But turns out nobody knew of such tickets they didn’t exist despite our email saying other wise. But we didn’t let this spoil the visit. Unlike our last visit in October 2020 where you had a tour guide . It’s now all done via individual hand sets. You look for the numbers as you tour the gardens and information is told to you from the handset. There is a separate entrance for wheelchair users into the hall where you can see exhibits . It’s easy to get round in the scooter with display information at a height that’s easy to read for wheelchair users. We had lunch in the pipers cafe which was something a disappointment compared to when we last visited. I have a number of allergies and unfortunately none of the sandwiches were. Suitable . We asked if they could make cheese and tomato sandwich but were told that’s not possible. Given all the media attention about people with allergies we were disappointed with the response. I have to eat when take my medication so had to manage on a slice of cake. I did email the office at the castle about both the ticket information and pipers cafe but haven’t had any response. Despite these issues it was a great day out. And everything is very accessible no matter what your disability. Piper cafe is fully accessible and has disabled toilets.