Accessible Days Out Across Casey and Cardinia

Published by SESI Care Services · Updated September 2026 · 4-minute summary

Quick answer: Across the City of Casey and Cardinia Shire, a handful of places publish access detail specific enough to plan a day around. Bunjil Place at Narre Warren has an adult change room with a hoist, shower and seat, plus Relaxed Performances and a dedicated Quiet Space. Casey Stadium and Cardinia Life both list a Changing Places facility, and so does Deep Creek Reserve at Pakenham, which also has an all-abilities play space and a Liberty Swing. Casey RACE has pool ramps, three hoists and water wheelchairs. Wilson Botanic Park publishes the surface and grade of every path, and Royal Botanic Gardens Cranbourne lends wheelchairs and scooters free. Several other well-known local spots publish nothing about access at all. Everything below was checked against council, venue or Parks Victoria sources in September 2026, and where nothing was published we say so rather than guess.

Key takeaways

• Four Changing Places facilities are confirmed: Casey Stadium, plus Deep Creek Reserve, Cardinia Life and Pakenham Train Station in Cardinia. Bunjil Place has an adult change room with a hoist but does not use that name.
• Cardinia’s Changing Places toilets and its Liberty Swing need an MLAK key. Free for Companion Card holders, ordered from Master Locksmiths by everyone else. Get it beforehand.
• Wilson Botanic Park publishes path-by-path detail, naming which loops are wheelchair suitable and which are strenuous.
• Bunjil Place is the only venue in either shire where we could verify a scheduled lower-sensory program and a named quiet space.
• A support worker’s time is usually funded from Core. Your own ticket is not. Entrance fees, tickets and memberships sit on the NDIA’s list of supports that are not NDIS supports.
• From 1 October 2026, community participation budgets are progressively reset as plans are reassessed or renewed. Raise unused outing funding before your next reassessment.

What we could actually verify

Place	Suburb	Accessible toilet	Adult change with hoist	Entry cost
Bunjil Place	Narre Warren	Yes, incl. gender neutral	Yes, with shower and seat	Not published
Casey Stadium	Cranbourne East	Yes	Yes, Changing Places	Not published
Casey RACE	Cranbourne East	4 change rooms	Change bed, plus 3 hoists	Standard entry
Casey ARC	Narre Warren	Accessible change room	Elevated bed and hoist	Standard entry
Wilson Botanic Park	Berwick	Yes, 2 locations	Not published	Free
RBG Cranbourne	Cranbourne	Yes, 2 picnic areas	Not published	Free
Myuna Farm	Doveton	Not published	Not published	$10, $8.75 concession
Deep Creek Reserve	Pakenham	Yes	Yes, Changing Places	No fee listed
Cardinia Life	Pakenham	Yes	Yes, Changing Places	Standard entry
Cardinia Cultural Centre	Pakenham	2 unisex, plus ambulant	Not published	By show
Cardinia Reservoir Park	Cardinia Reservoir	Yes, 2 picnic areas	Not published	Not published

“Not published” means the venue or its council did not state it in September 2026, not that the facility is absent. Ring first.

Casey, in detail

Bunjil Place, 2 Patrick Northeast Drive, Narre Warren. The accessibility page describes a fully accessible adult change room with a hoist, shower and seat, toilet rails and a lowered sink. The Plaza, Theatre and Studio are wheelchair accessible, with ramps and dedicated seating booked by phone or email. There is a hearing loop in the Theatre and infrared receivers from the Box Office elsewhere, and Companion Cards are accepted for complimentary carer entry. Relaxed Performances run with adjusted lighting and sound and a dedicated Quiet Space, and some shows are Auslan interpreted or audio described with a tactile stage tour beforehand. Accessible parking is on Patrick Northeast Drive with five-minute drop-off zones. The Gallery opens Tuesday to Friday 10am to 5pm and weekends 10am to 4pm, though no admission price is stated. Our Narre Warren page covers supports nearby.

Casey RACE, 65 Berwick-Cranbourne Road, Cranbourne East, and Casey ARC, 10 Patrick Northeast Drive, Narre Warren. For RACE, Casey Leisure lists eleven accessible car spaces near the entry, platform and handrail entry into both the warm water pool and the 50 metre pool, three hoists (change room, spa and warm water pool), water wheelchairs, a beach-entry leisure pool, and four accessible change rooms including one with a change bed. ARC has two accessible car spaces, ramp entry to the 50 metre pool, a spa hoist, an accessible change room with hoist and elevated bed, two in-water wheelchairs and a beach-entry wave pool. Both state free carer admission with a Companion Card. If you need a ramped warm water pool, RACE is the one. Casey Stadium, on the same Cranbourne East site, has seven accessible parking bays about 50 metres from the entrance and a Changing Places toilet and shower with an adult changing table and ceiling hoist. It is the only Casey facility a Casey source described to us in those words.

Wilson Botanic Park, 668 Princes Highway, Berwick. Free, open 7am to 6pm, or to 9pm during daylight saving. Council’s accessibility page lists accessible toilets in the Visitors Centre and Upper Shelter, a wheelchair you can borrow, a ramp from the car park, and assistance dogs throughout. The path detail is why this one is trustworthy: the Lower Shelter is 200 metres of level asphalt, the Anniversary Lake loop about 750 metres of generally flat asphalt, and the 3 kilometre Outer Park Loop is gravel with a 1 in 12 grade on the west side, described as possible but strenuous. The Hoo Hoo Lookout Tower is steps only. Accessible bays and adult change are not mentioned; council takes access questions on 9705 5599. See our Berwick page.

Royal Botanic Gardens Cranbourne, Ballarto Road and Botanic Drive. Free, open daily 9am to 5pm. The accessibility page states that every path in the Australian Garden is sealed or granitic gravel and suitable for manual and electric wheelchairs, that non-motorised wheelchairs are free to hire and electric scooters bookable free with ID, and that the Explorer people mover circles the garden every 25 minutes. Accessible toilets are at the Stringybark and Woodland picnic areas. No Changing Places facility is mentioned.

Myuna Farm, 182 Kidds Road, Doveton. Open 10am to 4pm daily, entry $10 or $8.75 concession. Council calls the farm wheelchair accessible and publishes an Access Key, but does not detail accessible parking, toilets or adult change. That gap matters where you will be outdoors for hours, so call first.

Cardinia, in detail

Deep Creek Reserve, 62 Cameron Way, Pakenham. An all-abilities play space with sand and water play, sheltered zones, sensory gardens and wetland boardwalks. Council lists accessible parking and public toilets, a Changing Places toilet and a Liberty Swing, both opened with an MLAK key. One caveat straight from council’s page: the Liberty Swing is currently listed as temporarily unavailable, so check before building a day around it.

Cardinia Life, 4 to 6 Olympic Way, Pakenham. Cardinia Leisure lists a Changing Places facility on site, accessible parking, hoists, several aquatic wheelchairs and a mobility device charging station. The same page is worth reading for the smaller pools: Koo Wee Rup has a PoolPod platform lift, two aquatic wheelchairs and an accessible bathroom with a hoist, while Garfield and Pakenham Outdoor list accessible entry and exit, accessible parking and a hoist.

Cardinia Cultural Centre, 40 Lakeside Boulevard, Pakenham. Six accessible parking bays with sealed paths to the entrances, two unisex accessible toilets with left and right hand transfers plus ambulant toilets, step-free seating in row G booked through the venue, a mobility recharge point and a communication board. The venue states that it accepts Senior and Companion Cards and that some performances offer Auslan interpreting or audio description. It does not mention a hearing loop, a Changing Places facility or a relaxed performance program.

Cardinia Reservoir Park and Emerald Lake Park. Parks Victoria lists accessible toilets at the Crystal Brook and Henley picnic areas of Cardinia Reservoir Park, an all-abilities accessible barbecue at Crystal Brook, and ramped paths to all picnic areas. At Emerald Lake Park, parking is $6 a day and free for disability permit holders, and council describes many wheelchair and pram friendly paths including the loop walk to Lake Nobelius, though accessible toilets and bays are not detailed.

Changing Places, and the key you need

Cardinia’s disability access and inclusion page names three Changing Places toilets, all in Pakenham: Deep Creek Reserve on Cameron Way, Cardinia Life on Olympic Way, and Pakenham Train Station on Drake Place, the last of which opened in March 2025 at Barring-buluk Park.

All three need a Master Locksmiths Access Key, which council states is free for Companion Card holders and otherwise ordered with documentation from a health professional. The same key opens the Liberty Swing. Casey publishes no equivalent list, which is a real gap: what we could verify there is Casey Stadium and the adult change room at Bunjil Place.

Who pays for what

The two halves of a day out are funded completely differently.

A support worker’s time is usually funded. Someone accompanying you to a park, a pool or a performance is normally claimed against Core, under assistance with social and community participation, and it is flexible within your Core budget. Getting there can also come from Core transport where your disability means you cannot use public transport. That is what our community participation and travel and transport supports cover.

Your own entry cost is not funded. The NDIA’s list of supports that are not NDIS supports rules out “tickets to music, theatre, cinema, sporting events, and conference fees or entrance fees”, “membership and entry to a recreational club”, and “costs associated with recreational sports and activities”. So the farm entry, the pool admission and the theatre ticket are yours, as they would be for anyone else.

That leaves the question people get caught by at the gate: the support worker’s own ticket. The Victorian Companion Card is the intended answer. It is for Victorians whose disability means they need a carer or support worker with them, the cardholder buys one ticket and the companion is admitted free at affiliate venues, and it costs nothing to apply. Casey Leisure states free carer admission at ARC and RACE, Cardinia Cultural Centre states it accepts the card, and Transport Victoria lists it as an eligibility category for a free travel myki. Where a venue is not an affiliate, we could not find a current NDIA rule this month settling who bears the worker’s entry cost, so agree it in writing with your provider before you book. Our post on low-cost community activities across Victoria covers the options where nobody pays anything.

The October 2026 reset, honestly

From 1 October 2026, participant support budgets for social, civic and community participation and for capacity building daily activities are being progressively reset as plans are reassessed or renewed. That wording is from the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing’s reform timeline, and the NDIA says the same on Securing the NDIS for future generations, noting budgets update over about twelve months and that eating and drinking assistance, education, employment and disability-related health supports are excluded from it.

Nothing changes in your plan on 1 October itself: the reset arrives with your next reassessment or renewal, so two people in the same street can be on different footing for the same school holidays. If community participation funding has sat unused because transport never got organised, raise it now rather than at the next plan meeting. Our guide to the 2026 NDIS changes has the wider picture, and Core Supports in the school holidays the family version.

What we could not verify

Being straight about the gaps is the point. Akoonah Park, 2 Cardinia Street, Berwick, runs a large Sunday market from 8am to 1.30pm but publishes no accessibility information at all: no parking, no toilets, nothing about surfaces underfoot. The market team takes calls on 0467 854 983. Berwick Springs Wetlands Reserve had an accessible public toilet approved, with construction expected to take about eight weeks from late July 2024, but we found no council notice confirming it is open. Casey Fields at Cranbourne East publishes a social story for visitors with autism or cognitive disability, but no toilet, parking or adult change detail. None of that means the facilities are missing. It means they are not published, and a forty minute drive is too much to spend on an assumption.

Frequently asked questions

Talk to SESI

If a day out has stopped happening because the logistics got too hard, tell us what is going on and we will work through the supports and transport with you.

Tell us what’s going on: sesi.com.au/referral · Call: 1800 017 374

This guide is general information based on City of Casey, Cardinia Shire Council, Parks Victoria, Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria, venue and NDIA sources checked in September 2026. Access features, prices and opening hours change, so confirm with the venue before you travel. In-person supports from SESI are delivered across Victoria. For questions about your NDIS plan, contact the NDIA on 1800 800 110.