All products featured on Condé Nast Traveler are independently selected by Condé Nast Traveler editors. However, when you buy something through our retail links, Condé Nast may earn an affiliate commission.
As the pool hoist lowered me into the water, I noticed how it bubbled up from thousands of feet underground. These thermal baths in Palm Springs, stewarded by the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians for more than five millennia and long considered a portal to the spiritual underworld and a place of healing, welcomed my paralyzed body. I began to float weightlessly as the surrounding San Jacinto Mountains turned pink in the evening desert light. I felt the strangest sensation of being received by something both ancient and entirely new.
I was in the California desert landscape of Palm Springs in search of wellness—an experience that, more often than not, evades people like me. Around the world, spas are often physically inaccessible, retreats off-limits by design, and practitioners limited in their ability and training to see disabled bodies as deserving of the restoration everyone so desperately needs.
The city lies roughly 130 miles east of Los Angeles , a distance that by any American metric is barely a blip on the map. It is easily reached by a highway that cuts cleanly through the Sonoran Desert, past wind turbines spinning in their hundreds. Arriving in the Coachella Valley , with its impossibly blue skies and neighboring Joshua Tree wilderness, one's sense of scale and perspective soon recalibrates; a prerequisite, perhaps, for experiencing a city that has long served as refuge.
From the 1930s, when Hollywood stars fled here to escape studio contracts that controlled their public images, finding sanctuary in midcentury modern villas hidden behind bougainvillea; to today, where the LGBTQ+ community has built a haven when few other places offered acceptance: Palm Springs has always known how to welcome the marginalized. Over a third of its residents now identify as queer. The question I had was whether that welcome extended to disabled travelers too.
"For families like mine, travel has always meant planning around what might go wrong," Josh Heinz, a local father of a son with autism, tells me over coffee one morning. "I wanted to flip that—to make sure people traveling to Palm Springs can plan around what might go right for once."
As well as being an invested parent, Heinz is also the community engagement manager for Visit Greater Palm Springs . Last spring, he spearheaded an initiative that led to Greater Palm Springs becoming the first destination in Southern California, and only the fifth worldwide, to achieve Certified Autism Destination status. Hotels, restaurants, and attractions across the valley have now completed specialized training to accommodate guests with sensory sensitivities: learning, for example, that a meltdown is not a tantrum, that fluorescent lighting can overwhelm, or that sometimes a quiet corner matters more than a view.
"One in 36 children in the US is now diagnosed with autism," Heinz continues. "One in six people have sensory needs or sensitivities. Yet the majority of families report hesitating to travel because they can't find safe options. We are so proud to have trained so many people across the region to make neurodiverse and disabled people feel welcome."
One of the first hotels to join the movement was the JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort & Spa . During my stay there, I made a visit to the hotel spa and quickly understood the impact training of this kind makes for all parties. When I transferred onto the treatment table in my own ungainly fashion—the kind of maneuver that usually prompts hovering hands and nervous glances—nobody blinked. Instead the therapist worked warm stones along my broken spine without hesitation, adjusting her technique without making me feel like an exception to normal service.I
Later, at The Spa at Séc-he , built directly atop those sacred hot mineral springs, I found myself wrapped cozily in a robe that could double as a duvet, watching the mountains disappear into violet dusk, as bodies of all shapes and sizes relaxed around me. The fact my wheelchair was barely noticed and pool hoists outnumbered sun loungers, in a world so often aggressively combative towards people who navigate the world differently, with all the physical and attitudinal barriers removed, a deep and uncommon calm settled over me. I barely moved for the next few days.
Advised that no trip to the city would be complete without a drag brunch however, I peeled myself away from a sun lounger on my final morning and headed to the Saguaro Hotel . Its rainbow-hued facade makes it one of the most Instagrammed properties in the Coachella Valley—and I could see why. "A drag brunch is a rite of passage, honey," drawled Navy veteran Kiki Masters, dazzling in a low-cut red sequin dress. "And no trip here is complete without one." My avocado toast arrived on cue as one of the queens executed a split with Broadway-level precision, inches from my table, and the room erupted into applause and screams of delight.
What caught my attention, however, beyond the lip-syncing and costume changes, was the family opposite me: the mother neat and composed, father in golf-course polo and chinos, two thirty-something sons cheering alongside a girlfriend who would not look out of place on a pageant stage. So entirely normal they seemed almost out of place. When I asked what brought them here, the mother didn't hesitate: "I want my boys to be exposed to different types of people and communities."
Deliberately family-friendly, the show was designed not only to entertain but to educate and in a country where difference is increasingly met with suspicion, here is a city that has made being welcoming a priority. "To see yourself reflected in a place, to move through it without apology or explanation, that's restorative in ways no spa menu can capture," says the brunch's host to me at the close of the show. "The LGBTQ+ community, the neurodivergent traveler, the wheelchair user, we are not exceptions to be accommodated. We are the point."
Before hitting the road, I stopped by the Agua Caliente Cultural Museum , where I learned that the Cahuilla people do not say goodbye but instead, as a wall text bids visitors, ‘ Áčaqun ehíčine’ or “go in a good way.” It's a parting phrase that functions as a blessing for the journey ahead. It seemed the perfect parting sentiment for a city built on the principle that everyone deserves refuge, and that wellness, in its truest sense, might simply mean being allowed to exist exactly as you are. Go well. After three days in Palm Springs, I can do exactly that.
Where to stay
Hampton Inn & Suites Palm Desert offers unfussy comfort in a central location, putting you within reach of downtown's best restaurants and galleries. For something more expansive, JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort & Spa spreads across 45 acres of grounds with multiple pools, lazy rivers, and golf courses. In neighboring Indian Wells, Renaissance Esmeralda Resort & Spa delivers a more intimate resort experience with direct access to world-class tennis facilities and the Indian Wells Tennis Garden. For understated luxury, The Ritz-Carlton in Rancho Mirage sits at the quieter end of the valley, with views that sweep across the San Jacinto Mountains.
All four hotels are wheelchair accessible with ADA-compliant rooms and facilities, and are Certified Autism Centers.
Where to eat and drink
Start with Farm , a farm-to-table standout that sources directly from local growers and delivers California cuisine without the pretension. The Front Porch captures that elusive neighborhood-favorite energy. For Mexican food done right, Tac/Quila serves great cocktails and ceviches that showcase the desert's surprising seafood game.
All three restaurants are fully wheelchair accessible with accessible parking and restrooms.
What to do
The Living Desert Zoo and Gardens is 50 acres of landscaped terrain that showcases the region's rich biodiversity. Rancho Mirage Library & Observatory is an architectural gem that doubles as a cultural hub; the night-sky programming here is enough to satisfy serious astronomy enthusiasts. For hands-on creativity, Children's Discovery Museum of the Desert , with rotating exhibitions, engages everyone from toddlers to adults. Take the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway for sweeping views of the valley floor and the surrounding desert peaks. And if you want to tap into local culture authentically, time your visit around the Riverside County Fair & National Date Festival , where you'll find three weeks of agricultural celebration, live music, and community-oriented entertainment.
All attractions listed are wheelchair accessible and ADA compliant. The Tramway, Living Desert, Library & Observatory, and Children's Discovery Museum are all Certified Autism Centers.
Originally Appeared on Condé Nast Traveler
