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The day before Charles MacAdams died, he climbed the North Col of Mount Everest.

He was elated. The 7,000 metre elevation was the highest he’d ever been, and he went to bed at base camp in good spirits.

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MacAdams, a Calgarian doctor who spent an abundance of time teaching medicine and mountaineering in the Himalayas, passed away peacefully the next morning, on May 11. He was 62.

“He sure got a kick out of standing on something tall,” said Jeff MacAdams, his son.

“I don’t know what drew him so strongly, but he really liked going to the Himalayas.”

But going to the area wasn’t just a “fly in, fly out,” deal for MacAdams, Jeff said. His father, a cardiac anesthesiologist at the University of Calgary, always paired his trips with some kind of medical work, be it teaching, training or assisting local doctors.

He cared about the people there, Jeff said. MacAdams often met the families of the people he knew in Kathmandu, and he invited one of the doctors he worked with there to Calgary.