- My name is Carl.

I'm 95 years old.

I live in a home for old people, we are about 150 people living in rooms like this.

And we get our food here, spend our time here.

It's a terrible thing to stay in a home for old people.

You don't do anything, you let the time go and you don't enjoy life.

You hope that it will be finished soon.

- [Interviewer] How often do you get outside?

- Once a day if I have the possibility.

And now and then, if we are lucky, we have a ride with a bicycle.

- Hey Carl!

- Hey, hey.

- Hi, I'm Ole Kassow and I'm your pilot for this episode of Joyride.

- Glad to see you.

- Good to see you.

This series is inspired by an organization called Cycling Without Age, which I founded right here in Copenhagen back in 2012.

So I've got the bike ready for you.

- Okay.

- [Ole] It's about engaging everybody from society with older adults who can no longer ride their own bikes.

Perfect.

Okay, Carl, ready to go?

- Okay.

Off we go.

- Yes, we go.

- [Ole] Yeah.

- [Carl] Vamos, Vamos.

- [Ole] Vamos, yeah.

- Your car's better Mine.

- It's a royal carriage.

Okay.

- It's good for the stomach muscles apparently.

- But bad for the kidneys.

- Bad for the kidneys, yeah.

People who struggle with memory loss and dementia gain great benefit from being on these bike rides, because it gives them a chance to reconnect.

And very often what happens is they start communicating and interacting again.

- I found out about Cycling Without Age about two years ago.

- Oh, look at the Swans down there, look to the left.

- Yeah, yeah.

- You know, the cichlids as well.

- [Carl] Well, I like to see historical places and I like to see good nature.

- [Ole] I almost consider these rides that we go on as time journeys, because what happens is that you get transported back in time.

Were you in the Army?

- No, I was too young.

And no, I were never in the Army, I was, what do we call it?

A milteranator.

- All right, you refused the military?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- And Ole is a very, very clear one, very good person - Going out for these bike rides, what do you think?

- Oh, I think it's very, very good for your spiritual health.

- Yeah.

- And for your contact with this, with the life around you.

I enjoy it very much.

And I can say after a good trip with a bike, I feel much healthier and much younger.

- [Ole] We're in Tivoli right now, and I'm gonna go and pick up my friend, Vivian McKee, who is, I think, just coming out of a dress rehearsal down here where she has a theater company.

Tivoli Garden is, it's a really old amusement park from 1843.

There are theaters, rides, and rock concerts and everything, it is smack in the middle of Copenhagen.

And we're going down here to a place called Glassalen.

It's a theater, and my friend, Vivian McKee, has a theater company.

She does this amazing show called "The Crazy Christmas Cabaret."

Oh, hey, Vivian!

- Hey!

- There you are.

- Yay.

- My Joy Ride.

- [Vivian] Look at that gorgeous theater over there.

- Oh, yeah.

That's a pantomime, isn't it?

- I mean, that is the panto, I've performed on that stage, and the peacock opens from the top outwards, so the feathers go down just like a peacock feathers do.

- [Ole] Oh, wow, wow.

- [Vivian] Isn't that marvelous?

- [Ole] Yeah.

- [Vivian] You know, it's so great for me to sit here, 'cause normally I'm sitting back there cycling, biking and piloting as you are.

And the other day I took Carl out, you know Carl?

- [Ole] Yeah.

- He starts off a bit grumpy, doesn't he?

- [Ole] He does, yeah.

- [Vivian] he can be a bit grumpy, but once you get him out into the fresh air, he brightens up.

But it's so wonderful to be the pilot and bike people around and we just pick these people up, and their whole expressions change, don't they?

- They do.

The original inspiration for starting Cycling Without Age was meeting an old man every morning when I was cycling to work.

And he was sitting on a bench in front of the nursing home, and we started greeting each other, and it just gave me the idea that I wanted to give him back his mobility.

The first ride I did in Cycling Without Age was, well basically, me showing up at the local care home, ringing the doorbell and asking if I could take some of the residents out for a bike ride.

And I was given an opportunity to take Gertrude, who was in her late eighties, out for a bike ride.

And so she was my tour guide and storyteller for the next hour.

She basically talked nonstop.

When I got back from the ride with Gertrude, the nursing home manager was very surprised that I had been told all these stories, because she told me that Gertrude had really stopped talking.

So the next day the nursing home manager called me and said, "Gertrude has just explained what happened yesterday "to everyone at the coffee table this morning, "and now they all want a ride too."

- [Vivian] Sitting in this, I feel so free, I feel ageless.

- Yeah.

- Which I think is great, you call your thing Cycling Without Age.

- Uh huh, yeah.

- Because it takes away your age as soon as you sit in one of these.

- Exactly, it doesn't really matter, age.

- [Vivian] Well, it is, it can be quite difficult to go through the streets of Copenhagen, let's face it.

You know, getting this wide thing around.

But you do it brilliantly, and I've learned from you.

- [Ole] Now we're going go and pick up, Pinilla, my partner, and her grandmother, Ina.

Hi.

- Hi.

- Hi, Ina.

- Hello, how are you?

- Vamos!

With Ina, we're gonna go through some of the inner parts of Copenhagen, and particularly down to Niha because I know that Ina loves to just sit at a little cafe and sip some rose or white wine.

You have translated how many books?

- Around 600.

- [Ole] Wow.

- [Ina] I started with cowboys.

- I've never read a cowboy book.

- I hadn't either.

And it was so funny, because when I translated one of those books, my family didn't dare come near me because I swore.

- [Ole] My dad was diagnosed with MS when I was three years old.

And after that, he became very lonely and socially isolated.

So to overcome his loneliness, he and I would spend a lot of time together.

I would push his wheelchair, and we would have an amazing time just interacting with other people, and laughing and telling stories.

What is it, Ina, you like about these bicycle rides?

- I can see a lot in a car.

You pass it quickly.

- [Ole] Ina and Pinilla, It was really lovely that you wanted to join on this ride, this joy ride.

Did you enjoy it?

- Oh, can we do it again?

- Yes, you can.

Skal.

- Skal.

- [Ole] So now we're picking up my friend, Kirsten.

She's a real veteran of Cycling Without Age.

She started out by being a pilot, one of our first, and now she's a passenger.

- Oh, here you are.

- [Ole] Oh, there she is.

- There she is.

- I've been enjoying the View, but waiting for you.

- Hi Kirsten, how are you?

- At last.

- Yeah, so good to see you.

Tell me about, so when we first met, you came to one of our gigs initially, one of our events, right?

- Yes, I was working as a nurse.

- [Ole] Yeah.

- But when I retired I thought, "Well, what am I going to do?

"I'm going to miss all my colleagues, I'm going to miss the patients."

Et cetera, et cetera.

So, and then I was so lucky to meet you and I immediately said, "Well, I want to be a pilot."

- Yes.

- And you know, I found out how wonderful it was to be able to take an old person out into the park.

And, you know, quite often I brought coffee and we sat together in the trishaw and had a cup of coffee and we also smoked in those days.

- Yes.

- And, but you know, the pleasure of being two equal beings out enjoying life.

But then unfortunately I've had some operations, et cetera, et cetera.

So now I'm happy to be in a trishaw myself.

- Yeah.

The power of a trishaw is that it creates this magic bubble in which anything can happen.

Wow.

And it gives you an opportunity to share experiences, and share secrets, and it feels as if all the barriers between people are just broken down when you're on the bike.

I'm eternally grateful for you being part of this movement.

I thought perhaps if you could pass it on to the next generation of pilots, because I think- - Oh, I'd love to do that.

- Shamila, she's an intern here at Cycling Without Age in Copenhagen, but she comes from Washington DC.

- Wonderful.

- And she's here for a couple of months.

- Yes.

- To learn about the organization and to give her time.

And I thought she'd be perfect for this.

- [Kirsten] Yes.

- Hi, Kirsten.

- Oh, hello Shamila.

- I heard you were coming, it's wonderful to see you.

Shamila, could you please tell me, how did you learn about Cycling Without Age and why did you come all the way from Washington?

- I'm here as a part of my scholarship program service project, and it really resonated with me because I love connecting with my family members and hearing their stories.

So here I am, and I'm so excited to be here and be doing bike rides all summer long.

- [Ole] What I really like about the intergenerational aspect of Cycling Without Age is that it gives me a chance to connect with a generation that I have lost.

And it goes both ways.

- I want to give you a few tips about how to be a good pilot.

First of all, don't be afraid of the bike.

Be gentle and don't rush.

You know, you are out here to enjoy, you don't need to go very swift from one point to another.

All people love to tell stories, and then maybe you will start asking this old person questions you wouldn't ask your mom, because old people have also been young and have a lot of experience.

And so it's a really win-win for both.

And it's a joy ride and joy.

So, you know, people are swimming here in the harbor.

- [Shamila] Oh, I love it.

- [Kirsten] I think I might be going for a swim.

If somebody can get me a towel, I will go for a swim.