A WELL-KNOWN senior who has been an athlete for years, taken part in many community activities and loves life will carry the Olympic torch here.
Betty Campbell, who recently celebrated her 88th birthday, intends to walk with the torch as far as she can but plans to have a wheelchair there to help if she needs it.
Campbell, a Seniors Games athlete, broke her pelvis two years ago at the games and it hasn't healed properly, she says.
But it hasn't dampened her spirit or excitement.
“I was thrilled to death. That's the honour of a lifetime,” she said about how she felt when told she was to be a torchbearer.
“I am one but I'm going to ride in a throne I think.”
Someone called her to tell her the news and she says she didn't apply to be a torchbearer.
“They said 'Betty, you are going to be one of the torchbearers.' 'Well, I said I'm tickled pink,'” she says.
She hasn't heard back from whoever called her and doesn't yet know where she will be walking along the course.
“I'm not going to run. I'll walk as far as I can with my cane and have my friend push the wheelchair and if I have to give up, I'll do it in the wheelchair,” she says.
“But I'm going to do it.”
She's happy to be doing the torch relay here.