Sights to behold

Being blind didn't deter Aucklander FRASER ALEXANDER and his partially-sighted wife from travelling in Europe. Their memories were shaped by sound, touch and smell.

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Some 20 years ago, when I was in my late 30s, a rare degenerative retinal condition meant I lost all functional vision. I was left with little sight but a “visual memory” - and the same underlying affinity for the novel, the curious and the unfamiliar that I'd always had. In short, I hankered after the kind of intellectual stimulation that only travel brings.

It's a desire that many might think would be significantly compromised by sight loss, but that's been minimal in my experience. The kind of ques- tions I might ask when picking and choosing destinations will be differ- ent from yours. The planning I do is occasionally viewed as eccentrically meticulous, spontaneity has unique logistical complications and I tend to gravitate towards multi-city bus tours, walking tours and bespoke accessibility offerings.

But for me and my partially sighted wife, Christina, it's funda- mentally all about the experiences we couldn't have without travel. For us to travel, a strategic blend of technology, ser- vices and human assistance is needed.

In my case, adaptive technology - designed to make accessing content easier - mainly centres on synthetic speech deliv- ered through a screen reader on my iPhone and my PC. Often available free, a screen reader app reads out on-screen text.

Virtual assistance is a more recent adap- tive technology option. Via simple voice commands from trained agents or Al-pow- ered autonomous response systems, I use a live video feed from my Envision smart glasses and AIRA (Artificial Intelligence Remote Assistance) to do things like navi- gate unfamiliar environments, identify and describe landmarks, scan and read text on menus and take the all-important oppor- tune photos.