Traveling with a wheelchair? Trains, planes, museums, etc.

What is your exact itinerary? And how do you plan to travel, by car or only public transportation?
Wheelchairs can be rented too and some cities give them for free to tourists.
Carrying a wheelchair on trains and buses is going to be challenging, and if you go to Venice it's going to be a challenge to use too, because all the dozens of bridges on the canals you must cross, have stairs up and then down.

Friends of ours - he uses a walker and a chair - traveled to Italy last year and said they found these two web sites very helpful

http://www.accessibleitaly.com/home_standard.htm
http://www.sagetraveling.com/italy-accessible-travel

We are traveling by train only to Venice, Florence, Rome, Milan. We are staying at apartments with elevators or only minimal numbers (<10) of stairs. In Venice, we are about 5 minutes walk from the train station, so not too many bridges to cross. I'm mostly concerned about access at museums, etc. In the US, I know we'd have no issues and could even check the chair at a coat check or bag check location, just not clear on how that would work in Italy.

Look at the difference between a wheelchair and a transport chair. The WC is built so that the patient can roll it so has bigger/taller wheels. The transport chairs have smaller wheels (so are usually lighter) but I'm not sure if they would do on cobblestones.

We traveled with my father who was 95 at the time and sounds like your dad. We found a wheelchair which allowed the back to flip so it could be used as a walker. We took it to Madeira and it worked great. He was able to use it in his room and to get around the hotel without our help but when sightseeing or he got tired, he could sit and be pushed. Caveat is that our son's took time away from their families to help us with Grandpa and they did most of the pushing but when Mr (72 at the time) pushed the chair he had no problem, though after we went on cobblestones a couple of times he said he'd prefer not to get bounced around so much, and that may be because the wheels are not as heavyweight as a regular wheelchair. It was easy to fold and unfold and has pockets to store items. My brother and family are traveling with our father who is now 97 and he took a lightweight wheelchair with wheels a bit stgronger as he thought the convertible one was hard to push. I think we got it at Parent Giving Store http://www.parentgiving.com/shop/excel-translator-1665/p/sp1/ but I just now saw this one http://www.carelinemedical.com/Transport/Combination-RollatorTransport-Chair/?gclid=Cj0KEQjw5YfHBRDzjNnioYq3_swBEiQArj4pdF7fXl0x4w_o0hRPXySFFLcBiaz0F762toGgZK7UA8UaAlVu8P8HAQ which is the same. If you decide to get one of these you should check the shipping and coupons to see which is less.

We used the wheelchair in the airport and had no problem. We even had connections where we had to walk onto the tarmac and climb the stairs to the plane and they took him and one person on a platform and lifted him to an entrance to the plane. It was quite an experience! They folded the chair and returned it to us as we deplaned.

It seems a portable wheelchair is a good option as you will be able to cover more ground and your Dad will be comfortable and also know that he's not slowing down the group. Hope this info is of some help.

I've always imagined Italy must be a difficult place to travel in a wheelchair but I've seen it done and I was about to link sagetraveling.com but saw someone beat me to it! It seems like an amazingly informative site. It's great that he can walk and luckily there are plenty of places in every town to take frequent sitting breaks and have excuses for coffee, gelato, or relaxing in a park, etc. I don't know much about wheelchair traction but I suppose you'd want to see if there's a type of wheel that's best for cobblestones or can adjust to different terrains? A wheelchair does sound better than a Segway rental for someone unsteady on their feet at times though.

Most museums have elevators but some are accessible only with museum staff key, just ask for the lift if you don't see it right away.

We were just in Italy with a folding wheelchair that I use for distances. The cobble streets are challenging, but it was nice to always have a place to sit down. We took a larger wheel version which is sturdier and easier to maneuver on the uneven surfaces. Most museums give free entrance to the person in a wheelchair and their helper.