Nova Peris returning to Canberra for two important journeys

The 52-year-old Olympic gold medalist and one-time Labor Senator for the Northern Territory will be one of the torch bearers at the Legacy Centenary Torch Relay in Canberra on Monday, her leg, fittingly, taking her past Parliament House.

Now living in Darwin, Peris will be back in the national capital soon after, on September 14, side by side with former Essendon AFL great Michael Long.

Starting on Sunday, Long is walking from Melbourne to Canberra to raise awareness and support of the Yes campaign for the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum.

Peris said she had to remain optimistic despite polls suggesting the referendum to establish a body called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice would not be agreed.

"I trust in the Australian people because you have to," she said.

"The notion of 'If you don't know, vote no' is really dangerous to democracy. Being informed is a really simple thing."

The mother of three and grandmother of one, now runs the Nova Peris Foundation to help Aboriginal communities in providing basics such as nutritious food and clean water.

She was honoured to be part of the Legacy torch relay, celebrating 100 years of Legacy Australia, saying she felt a "profound love and the most deep respect" for the nation's veterans.

Peris said Legacy was continuing the promise to veterans that their families would be looked after if they did not make it home.

Her own great-grandfather Jack Knox, served in the 2nd/16th Battalion AIF in the Syria/Lebanon and Kokoda campaigns from 1942 to 1945.

She completed the Kokoda Trail in Papua New Guinea last year in his honour, blogging the nine days it took her to complete the arduous journey.

"It is by far the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, even beyond sports," she said.

"In sport, we make sacrifices, but we do it because we want to. It wasn't until I did Kokoda that I understood what sacrifice really meant."