Cape Town - A Plumstead nursing home for the elderly will keep its doors open for another year - thanks to a group of bikers.
On Sunday 14 bikers from the Swallows Flight Motorcycle Club hosted a wheelchair race in Morpeth Road in a bid to help the community hold onto the Sunnyside Lodge Old Age Home for the frail.
The facility was considered a godsend to the elderly who could not afford private care. Some of the residents are mentally ill and living with Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases.
Sunnyside Lodge secretary Robyn Jordaan said the nursing home almost closed its doors earlier this year due to a lack of funding.
“Luckily we were able to turn it around,” she said. “The club gave us the opportunity by supporting us and throwing this event to get us the funding that we need.”
Jordaan said the nursing home also received donations from the community.
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Scores of excited children lined up on Sunday to take turns racing around the block in the wheelchairs provided by the facility, and screams of laughter filled the air as racers sped down Morpeth Road.
Nursing home patients basked in the sun and swayed to the tunes of Elvis Presley and the Beach Boys.
Swallows member Louis Anthony said the club, which was started 35 years ago, felt the need to take care of the elderly because “they were the homemakers who uplifted future generations”.
“Part of our aims and objectives are to work towards charitable organisations.
“We believe that as a group of biking enthusiasts, we can do more than one or two people. We value the work that Sunnyside Lodge does and that is why we willingly contribute and assist where we can,” he said.
The bikers also handed boxes of toys to the St George’s Home for Girls.
An excited Jamie-Lee Meintjies, 12, from the home for girls, said the wheelchair race was the highlight of her week. “We had so much fun,” she said. “I loved it.”
Cape Argus