The Pedalar Sem Idade project offers free bicycle rides to elderly men and women, helping to combat loneliness and isolation among the older population, and giving them back the city and the "right to the wind in their hair."
Joaquim Caldas used to walk around Quinta das Conchas with his wife, but since he lost her three months ago, he no longer has "so much enthusiasm"."I was very paralyzed"he says.
Joaquim attends a day care center in Lumiar and it is through it that he participates, from time to time, in free bike rides, where he doesn't have to pedal - he just needs to sit comfortably on a bike-shaped couch and enjoy the sun, the sounds, the landscape, and all the surrounding environment.
The tours of the initiative Pedaling Agelessly help get elderly people out of their homes, day centers, and nursing homes, giving them back the city and the 'Right to the Wind in their Hair', and allowing them to rediscover places where they have stopped going, either because of inertia or physical disability. If Joaquim tells us that he can still walk, being only "very lazy"Maria Helena, who accompanied him on the ride through Quinta das Conchas, laments her reduced mobility. With Pedalar Sem Idade you can "leaving home sitting down" and in good company. Her husband passed away "not long ago" And since then, Maria has felt more alone. The bike rides ("it's already the third time" at Quinta das Conchas, she tells us) have helped her to fight the loneliness of widowhood and also to forget, even if temporarily, the recent loss.
Joaquim and Maria had not spoken before, but they already knew each other from the Support Center for the Young and Elderly in Lumiar (CAJIL), with which Pedalar Sem Idade has a partnership. Every week, on Fridays, a volunteer from the project goes to that day care center to pick up two people for a walk around Quinta das Conchas. Each month, Pedalar Sem Idade carries out between a hundred and a hundred and a half rides, counting on "clients" in several partner institutions for the elderly; the project is present in Portugal through two associations: the Pedal No Age Portugallaunched in 2020 after a campaign for crowdfundingand represented in Lisbon, Cascais, Guimarães and Castro Verde; and the Pedal No Age Portowhich began in 2018 in the Invicta city. The two share the same philosophy, not least because the project of walking seniors on couch bikes was born in Denmark in 2012 under the name Cycling Without Age, and has since expanded to several cities and countries.
It was Ole Kassow who in 2012 created the non-profit organization Cycling Without Age. In a TEDx talk, he says it all started when he realized the older generations' loss of freedom and mobility and decided to show up at a nearby nursing home with a rented bicycle to offer rides. The initiative - which Ole sees as an action of citizenship - was such a success that the Dane repeated it with the support of the City Council, five bicycles, and a team of volunteers."What Cycling Without Age taught me was that even when you are nearing a hundred years old, life can and should be beautiful, and a nursing home should be a place of continuous joy and mobility."said the founder of the initiative in that talk. For Ole, Pedalar Sin Aged is about "fight for the right to wind in the hair"but also about providing a more active and happier old age. "When we get old, we lose the stories of our lives and the people who witnessed those stories. Can you imagine not having anyone around you who experienced what you experienced? Can you imagine not having anyone to laugh or cry with? And can you imagine knowing that soon all your stories will be gone?"he rhetorically questioned the audience.
The Pedalar Sem Idade tours are conducted with special bicycles, the trishaws. They are vehicles with a two-person padded seat in the frontIt is attached to an electric bicycle, which is guided by a volunteer at the back. The trishaws They have a canopy that can be put on in case it rains or to protect you from the cold. For those colder days there are even blankets under the seats for the passengers to keep warm.
On the day of Joaquim and Maria's walk, no blankets were needed, and the two even took a chance on style with sunglasses, such was the sun they had been gifted with that day. As he walked through Quinta das Conchas, Joaquim pointed out what had changed in that garden over the years. He still remembers it as a place with a bad reputation and the the idea of wanting to cut the space in half with a road. Saw the park being renovated and become a space of choice for many families. While Joaquim told his stories, Maria listened attentively. E from time to time, caught the attention of Inês Costa, 37, the volunteer who drove the two elderly people around the park. "Every now and then they want to talk to us"he tells us, while leaning on the handlebars to interact with the passengers.
Inês makes listening her profession. She is a translator and interpreter at the European Parliament, specializing in Polish, French and English. At Pedalar Sem Idade she has been a volunteer for about a year and the stories she hears are different. For Inês, the project is an escape from the routine of her job, which gives her the flexibility she needs to be able to go on the rides. In total, the Pedalar Sem Idade Portugal team has 240 volunteers in the various cities where it is present and 10 trishaws. In Lisbon, there are approximately four tours per day, usually 30-45 minutes, always free of charge. But, even though it doesn't charge for the laps, the association always accepts donations of anyone who wants to support the growth of the project - At this specific moment, Pedalar Sem Idade Portugal is carrying out a new campaign of crowdfunding to raise one more trishaw which, between the cost of the product and the cost of importing it, will amount to 14.6 thousand euros.
Inês started Pedalar Sin Aged with the help of Amos Pannesse. He is responsible for coordinating and training the project's volunteer force. Amos also started as a volunteer when he moved from Indonesia to Portugal in 2021, with his wife, and swapped boats for trishaws (Amos was a sailor). "It does my heart a lot of good when I see people with that smile at the end of the ride"He explains, detailing that it was this positive impact of the project on people and on the fight against loneliness that made him stay. "I did two to three months as a volunteer and then they offered me the job contract. I'm not a cyclist but I really like cycling."he says. "I manage the day-to-day operations of the walks and the volunteers. I help the volunteers do the walks and also give them training at the beginning."
In this training, it is not only important for the volunteers to receive tips on how to deal with passengers, but also on how to maneuver the trishaws. It takes some practice, as Ines and Amos say. The curves require some attention and the design of the bike paths was not always thought out for this type of cargo bicycles. When there is construction work, as happened that day on the way to Quinta das Conchas, Inês and Amos had to go in the wrong direction and get on the sidewalk because no decent alternative was created for cycling mobility - fortunately, they had no passengers on board. Driving on cobblestone roads is another difficulty for trishaws - Inês finds it uncomfortable "because everything shakes" when there is no one sitting in the front.
In addition to the rides held in the elderly institutions, Pedalar Sem Idade is often present at events and fairs offering rides to anyone, regardless of their age. If you know any elderly person in need of getting out of the house and feeling the wind in their hair again, you can contact the association. Pedalar Sem Idade Portugal is also available for new partnerships and funding opportunities. The contacts are as follows:
Margarida Guedes de Quinhones (executive director
E-mail: margarida@pedalarsemidadelisboa.pt
Phone: +351 931 768 300
Leonor Gameiro (operations coordinator)
E-mail: leonor@pedalarsemidadelisboa.pt
Phone: +351 916 264 754
