Kev and Bev are at it again
Taranaki’s famed wheelchairebike couple Kev and Bev could soon be expanding their range, in more ways than one.
Kevin and Beverley Harvey, who shot to fame after a story on Kev’s invention and the couple’s trips along New Plymouth’s iconic Coastal Walkway, are now working on a second bike that will take them further afield.
Despite assertions from Kev that he wouldn’t build another, he now has a ‘‘beautiful little fold-up bike’’ from Hāwera sitting disassembled in his garage.
When complete, the new design will allow him to put both the bike and the wheelchair into their car, opening up a variety of new locations.
‘‘With the current one, I can only get to Te Henui Stream and then Beverley wants to come home. I wouldn’t mind putting it in the car and seeing something new.
‘‘It’s all right for Bev; every day it’s a new thing for her – it’s entertaining . . . I think that’s one of my problems, trying to keep Bev entertained.’’
Kev’s leg – which he described as ‘‘buggered’’ in his initial interview, also seems to be coming right.
‘‘We’re all getting older,’’ Bev said. ‘‘I don’t know about bolder, but we’re sure getting older.’’
After appearing on Stuff, the story of Kev’s invention, a wheelchair welded to the front of one of his homemade electric bikes, went viral and they appeared in radio and television interviews.
But Kev and Bev have taken it all in their stride.
‘‘Girls were walking past saying ‘you’re famous’,’’ Kev said.
‘‘One of them told me I’ll have to take up acting and I said ‘I’ll have to get botox first’.’’
Kev keeps a copy of the newspaper by their chairs for Bev, who has dementia, to look at.
‘‘She forgets, you see, so it’s fresh for her every day, she reads it and she can’t believe it,’’ Kev said. ‘‘It’s not often I’m in the paper! I love reading,’’ Bev adds.
Kev said Bev used to read ‘‘book after book’’.
‘‘I’d come home after work and read a page – sometimes the same flaming page every night and then fall asleep, and she’d keep reading through the night.
‘‘She’d tell me about this, and tell me about that, and I’d say wow, you’re lucky you’ve got two lives going on, I’ve only got one.’’
‘‘It’s not often I’m in the paper!’’
Bev Harvey
on an article in North Taranaki Midweek on July 27