A GROUP of walkers raising awareness of first responders' mental health have arrived in Mildura as part of an epic 3000km journey from the heart of the country at Lambert Centre to the heart of the nation at Canberra's Parliament House.
Participants aim to raise awareness of the 14 recommendations of the 2019 Senate inquiry into first responders' mental health, and ensure they are acted upon.
Heart 2 Heart team leader and former police officer Paul Batista said the journey had the three clear goals of fundraising money, raising awareness and pushing for parliamentary action.
"I was a police officer for 33 years and got out quite a few years ago with physical issues and PTSD issues and it takes a long time to get through those,” he said.
“For me this is a matter that is very close to my heart.
"We are fundraising along the way, for the development of research projects into mental health and the mortality rate of first responders.
"We have some senators on board, we spoke to the local Opposition senator here and hopefully she is also going to take the messages into the Houses of Parliament."
The group have so far travelled for seven weeks covering a whopping 1700km.
"We've covered the Fink Road, we have walked the Oodnadatta Track, the Outback Highway, RM Williams Way, The Barrier Highway and we are just finishing the Silver City Highway and we are about to head to Robinvale,” he said.
Mr Batista said they had faced their fair share of challenges along the journey.
"Because there are long distances involved catering and logistics are issues, we have to plan ahead with the menus, fuel and camping locations,” he said. “Because we walk 40km every day we needed to regularly set up camp.
"Weather is also a challenge we've had rain the last few days so we've had to dry our swags and equipment, we've also had some repairs to do on the vehicles."
Despite this, Mr Batista said it had been an amazing journey.
"The Oodnadatta Track was amazing, the Silver City Highway was great, we did our last bit of remote camping here and had two movie nights where we watched the Matilda's game and the Castle.
"We have travelled over 1700 km we have another 1300km to go we have five full weeks and four days to go."
People looking to donate or follow along with the journey can do so here.
