Residents Bikes El Camino Trail

Glastonbury resident H. Veronica Southby in front of Cathedral de Santiago in Santiango, Spain. Southby biked for 45 days and 803 miles across the Camino de Santiago this summer.

Prior to leaving on her extraordinary adventure across Spain, H. Veronica Southby had one goal — to talk to God. 
           
She ended up getting her wish and much more. 
           
In the beginning of 2022, Southby decided to make some changes in her life and began planning an epic biking expedition across the Camino de Santiago, known in English as the Way of St. James.
           
Southby, a lifelong resident of Glastonbury, had served in the military for 20 years prior to being medically discharged after being hurt on-duty in 2013 while serving as a nurse in the Navy. 
           
From the injuries she sustained during her military service, she became dependent on pain pills and other over-the-counter medications. She also said she had developed a poor diet and would drink to excess on occasion.  
           
After 45 days and 803 miles on a bicycle, Southby had shed the excess weight, weaned off all medications, and found a new lease on life.       
           
Despite saying she met the worst version of herself on the trail, Southby described her lengthy journey across Spain as “the time of a lifetime” and “transforming.”
           
Starting her ride in San Sebastian, Southby “cathedral hopped” across the Northern Coastal route, making the ancient pilgrimage to Santiago before finishing off the quest by peddling to the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.
           
Southby recalled being disappointed during the early stages of the ride because her intention to talk to God was not received, but she soon discovered the true meaning of her ride was the life-altering changes she was making along the way.
           
However, upon arriving at Santiago de Compostela Cathedral — the burial palace of Saint James the Great, one of the apostles of Jesus Christ — she was finally granted her original wish. 
           
“He had a lot to say,” Southby recalled of her conversation with God. “I had to make some adjustments.”
           
Her trip started in early June when she got aboard the Queen Mary 2 in New York and sailed to England before flying to Rome to spend 10 days around Vatican City. She then made stops in Malta and France before finally beginning the grueling cycling odyssey.
           
Cycling Concepts, located on 2343 Main Street in Glastonbury, had fitted Southby with a bicycle and all the accessories, which were shipped overseas. She credited owner Keith Sherman with setting her up with the perfect bike — a forest green Cannondale — and getting her the proper gel seat and hand grips, which she said made all the difference. 
           
Southby said she was amused that the staff at Cycling Concepts had a betting pool amongst them whether she would be able to finish the rugged ride. 
           
She also joked that family and friends were “planning her funeral” and she recalled a time during training when she fell down while dismounting her bike near her house as a neighbor drove by.      
           
None of the naysayers dissuaded her from tackling the goal she had set forth and, with the help of travel company Macs Adventures, she set off to prove them wrong.
           
And prove them wrong she did, battling through the elements — which included a heat wave that reached 110 degrees — and a series of setbacks that nearly derailed the trip. 
           
First there was a flat tire that she had to endure in the Basue region about seven miles outside of Lezama. After discovering the flat, she spotted a farmhouse across a cow field and approached for help. At first, she was turned away by a man that answered the door, but as darkness crept in she approached the house again and this time the man’s wife answered the door — and her prayers. 
           
Aingeru, which translates to Angel, had done part of the trail before and could sense Southby’s desperate situation, so she provided a ride to the nearest town. 
           
Later in the journey, Southby took a wrong turn and was caught on a beach of Vega. After plodding through the dense sand, she eventually spotted the trail on the cliff above her but couldn’t get her bike up a steep, rocky slope. Two men, who were nude-sun bathing on the beach, carried the bike up the embankment wearing only their tennis shoes.
           
Southby said both experiences were “by the Grace of God.”
           
Upon finishing her journey, she decided to pay it forward and gave her $1,000 bicycle to the kid that was originally tasked with packing up the Cannondale to ship back over to the United States.  
           
She said at first the young man didn’t want to accept the gift, but she insisted and when she returned to bring him the accessories, she recalled the boy had tears in his eyes. 
           
Between the training and the trek, Southby lost 30 pounds and returned with a new perspective on life, saying, “I don’t worry anymore.” 
           
Southby — a widower who lost her husband, Gary Southby, to complications from cancer on the day of the couple's 22nd wedding anniversary in 2019 — said the stresses from her past are behind her and that the experience has forever changed her.
           
“Things are different now and I will never go back,” added Southby, a 1981 graduate of Glastonbury High School.
           
Southby, now 59, has been retired from nursing for two years and said she wants to be a positive influence on her sons, Mac and Augie, and continue to eat a clean diet like “Jesus cooked.” 
           
The conversation with God may have been the highlight, yet she added that she also changed her religious perspective in the process. 
           
She discovered that it doesn’t matter if you’re in the most elaborate cathedral in the world or in a tiny wood chapel, “God will show up with a single candle” and added that “God was no more on the trail than He was back in Glastonbury.”
           
Southby said there are no future trips planned and for now, she will start playing the violin again and sew new altar clothes for St. Dunstan Church.  
           
​“I want to live what I learned. I want to keep the weight off and never again go back to the way I was living,” added Southby, “Enough happened that was not coincidentally that I am sure that God is here with each and every one of us if you want him to be.”