Ben King’s big ride: 10,000km, 10,000 photos, $10,000 for charity
Photographer, cyclist and adventurer Ben King. Photo: Supplied.
Some 40 people turned up at the Patons Rock home of Bruce and Jessica King last Saturday night to see a travel slide show with a difference.
Their son Ben King, 27, spoke and showed 232 of his best photographic images from his 10,000km cycle ride between May and December last year, a trip that saw him start in Budapest, Hungary, and finish in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh.
The objective of the journey for Ben, a mechanical engineer who now specialises in designing medical equipment, was to raise money for The Cambodia Trust, in particular for the training of specialist personnel to fit prosthetic limbs onto mainly landmine victims. He raised around $10,000, with nearly all the donations coming from businesses and individuals. High-profile mountaineer/amputee Mark Inglis is another New Zealand fundraiser for this cause.
Ben explains why he wanted to maintain such a good photographic record of his ride: “I felt it’s so hard to put such a journey into words. Each day was so different from the previous one: the terrain, the weather, the people, even the food. I took endless photos as I went, saving around 10,000 of them onto the small hard drive I carried with me for backup. Some I snapped without stopping. My camera was always handy in the bag strapped to my handlebars.”
His cycle was a Surly ‘long haul trucker’ purchased from the Quiet Revolution cycle shop in Takaka before he left. His trusty steed needed little more than three puncture repairs and replacement brake pads as it took Ben across Hungary, Serbia, Greece, Turkey, Iran, India, China, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand before reaching Cambodia. Six visas had to be organised in advance for the 10 border crossings. On his best day he covered 162.6km on a mad dash to get through Istanbul, but his average was around 75km a day. He accomplished 12 mountain passes over 3,900m, the highest being 5,500m in northern India. His pannier bags weighed around 17kg, a quarter of that being his sophisticated camera gear. Ben dismounted a few times to push his bike, but only up the steepest mountain passes through China and on a couple of rocky road stretches in India that were just so rough they were impossible to bike over at all.
Only twice did he have to take a plane (with his bike on board) to avoid several short but dangerous border regions between Iran and India, and the entire country of Pakistan. He was allowed through one restricted military area that required a special permit. Rubbing shoulders with military personnel became routine, with Ben receiving a gift from one clearly impressed Chinese general.
The rider came through relatively unscathed despite over 30 separate dog attacks. The worst incident on the whole trip was a night-time assault in a Tehran street by six thugs who wanted his bags. He successfully fought them off but sustained bruising and a bleeding nose.
Ben found he had to eat around seven meals a day to maintain energy, but still lost 10kg over the six months. His trip finished on a high note in Phnom Penh with TV coverage and an exhibition of his photos. Media interest all along his route was high, with a newspaper story appearing about him in Serbia and a magazine article in Iran, amongst others.
Born in California, Ben moved with his parents to Nelson at 10. He attended Canterbury University before training in Sweden, where he now lives much of the year. It wasn’t until 2006 that his family shifted to Patons Rock, where he spends his summers. His career has focused on designing and building equipment like a portable, mechanical CPR resuscitation device that he hopes might one day be used in remote ambulance situations such as in Golden Bay. His latest summer project in Patons Rock was the building of a three-wheel bicycle for his 32-year-old Auckland-based brother, Dan, who has been in a wheelchair since a brain lesion affected his motor co-ordination at the age of three. After building the prototype from a couple of old mountainbikes, Ben constructed the new model completely from scratch, including the frame, the whole project taking him over 200 hours.
Says Ben: “The effort that goes into these projects can have long-reaching benefits, like the money I raised from my ride. That will go a long way in Cambodia, training people to help disabled people well into the future—generations even.”
To catch up with Ben’s travels, or to find out how to donate to The Cambodia Trust, visit <www.bikeben.com>.
Gerard Hindmarsh
