We traveled to Paris and London with someone of similar age and we took a lot of buses in both Paris and London. It was much easier for her to get on and off the buses than the metro and tube and the minute she got on the bus, someone always got up to give her a seat.

We also ordered a wheel chair for her at each airport and it really came in handy since there is a very long walk from the entrance to the gate. Plus we were delayed a bit at security for a hand inspection of one of the bags at Heathrow and it was a good thing she got to sit in the chair for the 45 minute wait it took until they performed all the hand inspections in the line up. I forgot to put the Off bug spray in the checked bag.

I've traveled with my elderly mother to London and Paris four times since she's turned 80, the last trip in April of 2010 when she was 88. The first three trips we stayed in hotels, but this last trip we rented a flat which worked out perfectly. After a few hours out and about, she was ready to return to the flat for a rest. It seemed nicer for her to be able to rest in the flat where she could make a cup of tea, watch TV if she wanted and have an actual living area to be in instead of sitting on the edge of her bed or on a desk chair in a hotel room. For us, the flat was perfect since she did spend a fair amount of time there.

I also agree that travel by bus was much easier than the tube. When she was 80, she loved to travel by tube but on this last trip the stairs would have proved too difficult for her. We always took our time wherever we were going for the day, so the bus worked out for us.

I hope your trip with your mother makes as many lovely memories as mine have.

All this help but we apparently have lost the OP. Hasn't been back since starting this thread.

Good grief! Not everybody lives on the internet! Some people have real lives.

It has been 3 days since the OP posted on this travel board. I would give him or her at least 2 weeks before declaring they are "lost". The people who hang onto every post on Fodor's and buddy up to the editors and monitors strike me as the "lost."

A couple of summers ago my wife, SIL and I took my MIL on a two+ week trip to England and Ireland. She was 81 at the time.

We began with 3 days in London, then flew into Dublin and picked up a kind of SUV at the airport. We were going to try to track down her family history, so we headed to Trim and Castle Pollard. Unfortunately, even though we found this man in Castle Pollard who was kind of the unofficial records keeper, MIL had the family name wrong. We then drove down to a cottage we had rented about 30 miles west of Limerick, where we spent the next 5 days exploring.

We then flew out of Shannon to Bristol, got a kind of station wagon and spent several days in the Cotswolds.

Here is what made it work well. We found this portable mobility scooter, I think it is called the EZ Traveler. It completely folds up to about the size of a large suitcase. You do not take anything apart on it, it just folds up. It has two detachable battery packs, so you remove the battery before you fold it up. Without the batteries it weighs less than 50 lbs. Each battery pack weighs about 15 lbs. You can get about 10-14 miles between the two packs and they charge overnight. The weight was important, because I would have to take it in and out of the back of the car whenever we stopped, and we stopped a lot. I also attached 4 of those hooks that you use on a pegboard to the back of the seat, so we actually used her as our "pack mule" while going places. It worked out great, she could ride down sidewalks, cobblestone streets, grassy knolls, you name it, we went there. I bought a refurbished model and I think it cost less than $900. While she is now in a nursing home and has her big scooter, the portable one is at my step-daughter's house for her to use when she visits or they take her places.

In London, many of the cabs have wheelchair ramps, so the girls would first get in the cab, then I'd literally drive the scooter in and sit on it when we did a taxi. With it's range, one battery pack more than took care of each day's use and with the speed control we could set it where we would all be going at the same leisurely pace. The hooks were great for backpacks.

While the airlines will carry essentially any type of mobility scooter, this worked not only due to putting it in and out of the car, but she could just drive it right up to the door of the airplane at the airports, and then go to her seat. I'd fold it up and the gate guys would stick it in the plane like a stroller. It would be waiting for her as she got off the plane. Believe me the baggage guys were amazed at it and loved how light it was and easy to handle.

By the way, this included 2 flights on RyanAir and no problems. There is no charge for mobility devices, but the big ones are impossible to move around.

Hope that helps,

dave

"<i>I would give him or her at least 2 weeks before declaring they are "lost"</i>"

I didn't post that for 'fun' or to be mean. There is a pattern - s/he hasn't acknowledged help in the past. Doesn't necessarily mean s/he won't be back. But maybe we have more invested in this trip than the OP does.

I do hope s/he comes back -