Cancer survivor walking the Old Spanish Trail; slows down life and enjoys the journey

Colin Campo, The Courier
·4 min read
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After diagnosis and treatment for Stage 4 cancer Edie Littlefield Sundby wanted to see the world and its people, so she started walking. That journey brought her to Houma, but it's not her ultimate destination.

Sundby was diagnosed with cancer in her gallbladder which had spread to her liver, colon, and elsewhere. After 79 rounds of chemo, and 4 major surgeries the cancer is in remission. Six months after doctors removed her right lung, Sundby said she began walking as part of her healing process -16 years later, and she's still going.

"You can't wait. If you want to do something you just have to get out and do it," Sundby said. "You can't plan, you can't get in shape."

Sundby authored a book about her time walking an old Jesuit mission trail in Baja California Mexico after her initial treatment. She gives her account of trekking 1,600 miles through the Californian and Mexico deserts. The book's title is The Mission Walker and can be found online at Amazon.

Edie Littlefield Sundby memorializing her visit to Houma with a photo. Sundby is walking the Old Spanish Trail, a 2,750 mile path from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. She began the journey in Texas, and is now passing through Terrebonne and Lafourche.
Edie Littlefield Sundby memorializing her visit to Houma with a photo. Sundby is walking the Old Spanish Trail, a 2,750 mile path from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. She began the journey in Texas, and is now passing through Terrebonne and Lafourche.

She began a new journey on February 4. Sundby, 71, began walking the Old Spanish Trail, a 2,750-mile trek from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. She clears about nine miles a day. She said she isn't in a hurry, and instead wants to focus on the people and the places she encounters. Mortality, she said, is a powerful motivator.

"It changes your entire perspective of what's important," she said. "I walk to slow life down."

While the trail is a straight shot from one ocean to the other, Sundby has the freedom to take it in portions. Starting in San Antonio, she's heading east through Louisiana on old LA 90, now LA 182. She said the path was once used as a cattle trail from Mexico to the Mississippi River. By March 15, she plans to be in New Orleans, and at the Mississippi border by March 21. When she reaches the Atlantic, she'll start back in Texas and head the other way.

During their travels, she and her husband Dale bring a camper van to stay in at night. When he's able to, he rides his bike alongside her while she walks.

Edie Littlefield Sundby taking a photo by an LA 182 sign. Sundby is walking the Old Spanish Trail, a 2,750 mile path from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. She began the journey in Texas, and is now passing through Terrebonne and Lafourche.
Edie Littlefield Sundby taking a photo by an LA 182 sign. Sundby is walking the Old Spanish Trail, a 2,750 mile path from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. She began the journey in Texas, and is now passing through Terrebonne and Lafourche.

The beauty of the journey, said Sundby, is getting to take in all the sights and being connected to the history. She enthusiastically tells the history of the cattle trail, how parts of Texas used to be Mexico, and how small groups rallied and blazed a path through the swamps to create the Louisiana portion of the trail.

"People forged a road straight through the state," she said. "Those are the kind of things that communities can accomplish."

Walking these distances takes fuel, and Sundby is enjoying the local cuisine between steps.

"Oh I eat everything in sight, and here in Louisiana that includes gators," she said. "I mean I love the cuisine."

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She said the best creole food she's had so far is Norbert's Restaurant in Broussard. She said she ate fried chicken and fried rabbit there. The couple, Norbert and his wife Lillie Mae have been cooking there for 60 years and often sell out of plate lunches by about noon.

Between meals Sundby can get philosophical which is not out of character, she said, since Plato and Aristotle both had things to say about the health benefits of walking. Being on the road so much has taken her away from the daily trappings of the internet, and she said more people should try it.

The internet opened up the world, but shrunk people's horizons, she said. Visiting many communities has allowed her to encounter cultural differences, but people are far more similar than the media portrays.

"What you see is just all of the stuff that's manufactured by the media for clickbait that really accentuates the differences and the problems," she said. "When you are out there, you realize that if everyone went out there and started walking their neighborhoods, to another town or whatever, I think everyone would start loving each other a lot more."

This article originally appeared on The Courier: She beat cancer. Now she's walking the 2,750 mile Old Spanish Trail