Editor’s Note: “Letter From…” is a monthly travel column written by a Mainer or person with ties to the state. Dr. Bernie Dahl of Winterport wrote this month’s column. A retired pathologist and mountain climber, who survived a near-death experience on Mount Washington in 1999, Dahl ventured earlier this year to base camp on Mount Everest.

At last, after years of anticipation and planning, the quest was realized.

For 10 days I climbed slowly up the Khumbu Valley in Nepal to reach the Everest base camp, a squatter’s settlement on a great expanse of shifting glacial ice mixed with dirt, fragments of rock and yak droppings. It was not smooth and flat as expected, but strikingly irregular with tall shafts of dingy gray ice jutting skyward and alternating with sunken holes covered with a flat layer of ice through which drinking water was drawn.

On several promontories, Buddhist shrines stood proudly, draped with long prayer flags that fluttered in unison in the direction of the prevailing breeze. There were more than 100 shelters of varied sizes, from small makeshift lean-tos covered with blue plastic to large geodesic-style tents emblazoned with brand names like Mountain Hard Ware and NorthFace.

This surrealistic and unstable world was home to more than 250 people, foreign mountaineers and native Sherpas focused on the summit, as well as a vast array of support staff. Placed strategically were several satellite dishes, aimed at the sky to report the challenges, successes and failures of the day. The cost of failure was not only in terms of time and money, but often paid for with lost digits, toes, ears, limbs – even lives.

This trek, this trip of a lifetime, was part of a series of high-mountain trips planned back in 1989 when my wife, Elaine, and I climbed Kilimanjaro – the highest mountain in Africa – as a part of the centennial celebration of the first climb of Hans Meyer of Germany. The world of mountaineering had just entered the age of the “Seven Summits,” in which the quest became to ascend the highest mountain on each of the seven continents.

In the intervening years, while practicing medicine full time, as an amateur mountaineer I was privileged to climb Mount Elbrus in Russia – the highest in Europe – and Aconcagua in Argentina – the highest mountain outside the Himalayas. Was I becoming caught up in the full commitment of the Seven Summits challenge?

To maintain some sort of physical and mental shape, I developed a regular exercise schedule at Gold’s Gym and practiced on mountains in Colorado and California, as well as on volcanoes Popo and Ixta in Mexico. I also practiced on Katahdin in Maine and the White Mountains in New Hampshire with a focus on Mount Washington.

During a one-day, solo-training hike on Mount Washington on Oct. 23, 1999, my future mountaineering plans almost ended, when I became trapped in unexpected whiteout conditions with wind gusts up to 98 miles per hour.

Fortunately for me, veteran rescuer Mike Pelchat and his team saved me after searching more than five hours. I had a reprieve – a stay of execution allowing me to continue to hike the big mountains – if I dared.

Since my rescue in 1999, I have continued to climb mountains worldwide. In addition, I have shared the story of my Mount Washington rescue – my errors, the risks, the rescue, the good fortune – and what impact that experience has had on my view of life. I have three words of advice: Be prepared to die. Have a plan to live. Do it now.

I have told my story in venues throughout the U.S., France, India, and recently in Nepal and Singapore. I have served as the keynote speaker at high school and college graduations, service clubs, conventions, conferences and children’s programs.

Several schedulers have been concerned about too much focus on death so we have adapted the program for different ages. With the audience, we develop a list of my errors, mistakes and risks and another list of the good decisions that were made on the mountain. We focus on the two rules of successful high-altitude mountaineering – return safely and reach the summit – always in that order. We have also created a Web site at www.MtWashingtonMisadventure.com, which tells the story of the rescue, as well as a reenactment of it for the StormForce series on The Learning Channel.

While at the Everest base camp and the nearby infamous Khumbu icefall, I was asked why I had only attained the Everest base camp and had not struck out for the summit in the spirit of the full Seven Summits.

My answer was simple. At 62, I felt that I was too old to try for the summit of Everest. However, Elizabeth Hawley of the Sir Edmund Hillary’s Himalayan Trust countered with the interesting fact that the Japanese mountaineer, Toshio Yamamoto, had done just that at the age of 63.

Next year, perhaps, my own quest will continue.