Volunteer bike riders needed to help trishaw passengers 'feel the wind in their hair'

Cyclist Elaine Fotu loves nothing more than taking less mobile people for a spin along a bike path so they can feel the breeze and see the ocean.

“If I can make some elderly person or some disabled person’s life a little bit happier for a couple of hours then why not?” Elaine said.

Elaine is a volunteer with the newish charity Cycling Without Age Illawarra which is so popular it has a waiting list for its free service and is seeking more riders to help it shift up a gear.

“We get as much out of it as the passengers,” Elaine said.

“It’s euphoria for us. For the next hour or two afterwards, we’re on top of the world because we’ve helped someone and we’ve been out in the sunshine. You get a lot out of it.

“I want someone to do this for me when I’m older – but that’s not the reason I do this.”

Elaine and fellow volunteer Dave Whitelaw, who has been on two wheels since he was five and loves nothing more than sharing the joy of cycling, each piloted an electric trishaw with two passengers.

Their guests, from Warrigal Multicultural Village, Warrawong, were rugged up against the winter chill with blankets round their knees for a spin from Towradgi to Bellambi and back again.

Alex Ianella, Peter Eman, Zaharije (Nick) Nikolic and Denise White were full of praise for their pilots, one of them offering to ride the trishaw himself. After all, he was only 91.

The Cycling Without Age movement started about 12 years ago in Denmark and has been in Australia for about six years.

“We started about 18 months ago and did some fundraising to purchase the bikes which are imported from Copenhagen,” Cycling Without Age Illawarra president Paul Taylor said.

Paul said the group spent the first 12 months raising funds. They took a borrowed trishaw to Wollongong Mall to collect donations from residents and visitors.

“We received a BlueScopeWIN Community Partners Grant also,” Paul said.

“And we had one young fellow – Josh Berry – who raised $6000 by riding 100 loops of Ramah Avenue at Mt Pleasant, known as an Everest event.”

The 100 loops up this steep street are the equivalent to the elevation of Mt Everest, Paul said.

The group now has two electric trishaws valued at about $22,000 each.

“The electric bikes are easy to ride and they are very comfortable for our passengers,” Paul said.

“We take people who are unable to ride themselves out for a ride along our beautiful cycleways.

“I’ve always been involved with charities for the past 60 years. I’m a passionate bike rider and I saw this as a great opportunity to get people out of their homes and out cycling.

“Our motto is ‘feel the wind in your hair’ and certainly along the cycleway in the sunshine it works so well.

“We’ve got a lot of interest from the aged-care facilities but we don’t have enough people to actually take them out on rides.

“So we are really looking for people who are retired, maybe, and available Monday to Friday and can ride a bike. If they were available one day a month for three hours that would be wonderful.”

The group provides training for the trishaw pilots and the cyclists who ride in front and behind as scouts to let other cycleway users know they are coming through.

The group has six active volunteers plus quite a few behind the scenes doing the administrative work.

But it’s out on the cycleway that volunteers have the most fun, hearing other people’s stories and feeling the wind in their hair.

For more information, contact Cycling Without Age Illawarra on 0402 413 482 or email [email protected]; to donate click here.