Tri Nguyen is walking from Melbourne to Canberra towing a wooden boat in his own quiet plea for better treatment of asylum seekers.

The road trains roar past on the Northern Highway between Wallan and Kilmore, but it doesn't faze him.

Tri Nguyen walks to Canberra to say thank you for the kindness he received as a refugee. Credit:Angela Wylie

In 1980, when he was eight, true fear was the threat of men with guns capturing the refugee boat in which he was fleeing Vietnam. The 68 refugees were taken to a Malaysian island and housed in a fenced compound.

They were fed a cup of rice a day and strip-searched at night. His uncle later told him women refugees were raped. The 42-year-old Brunswick Baptist pastor has ''blocked a lot out'' from the experience, but remembers hearing ''screaming and crying''.