A view from the top

Retirement was just start of new adventures

The dirt on the bill of his Big Mountain cap may be Glenn Nye's favorite souvenir of his latest adventure.

But it's the emotional residue of scaling Mount Kilimanjaro's 19,340-foot height and watching the sunrise crack over the ancient African horizon that will not wash out of the Whitefish man's mind.

"There was an overwhelming sense of accomplishment - that you did it. You made it to the top," Nye said of his six-day trek alongside two sons half his age, a couple former medical partners and a couple of their associates.

Between his Sept. 11 departure and return to the States 12 days later, Nye's outlook changed subtly but irrevocably on that trail.

"WE STARTED the final ascent at midnight from 15,000 feet," the 60-year-old retired cardiologist recounted.

By then, they were four days and 9,500 vertical feet into their hike up the mountain in Tanzania's northern stretches.

Drifts of sulfur still floated on the air over the extinct volcano.

From their temperate, damp, forested start, they had hiked through six-foot tall heather and into open moorland carpeted with bushes and shrubs. On the third day they had clung to hand-holds as they crossed along the Barranco Wall, moving from their first 13,000-foot camp to the next. Another below-freezing night. Then they launched out for base camp.

At the fourth nightfall, bedrolls came out for a few hours' rest in the 10-degree chill before the final push.

The night was pitch black save for the hikers' headlamps. Good weather brought crystal-clear air. The first-quarter crescent moon would not show up until an hour before sunrise.

"There were a million stars," Nye said.

The savanna below would not send its mist-soaked clouds up to Kilimanjaro's shoulders until the morning sun warmed the landscape. It was still long until daylight on this mountain 205 miles south of the equator. Nye's guided climbing party would have a half-dozen cloudless hours before scrambling the final dusty meters to the summit.

"Everybody has their own method" for keeping focused through the exertion and thin air, he said. "For some, it's counting … Some speak French. Mine was just to think about reaching the summit."

The crown of Africa's highest peak - and one of the world's largest free-standing mountains - had been his focus not just on the six-day hike, but for the past year of conditioning since his son-in-law had convinced him and Nye's two sons that they should undertake the challenge. His son-in-law had to cancel, but the others pushed on.

At 5:55 a.m. Sept. 18, the summit was theirs.

"When I made it and saw the sunrise, I cried," Nye said.

The brilliance began as a thin line across the horizon to the east. It spread to illuminate the plain far below as an awe-struck Nye simply watched.

There was a satellite phone call to his wife, Louisa, back in Whitefish. There were a few more minutes for taking in the grandeur.

Then it was time to go. Before altitude sickness had a chance to take hold, their three guides shepherded them back down the rocky trail salted with the dust of arctic desert.

Back at 15,000 feet in Barafu Camp, they breakfasted before tºrailing along the Mweka Route to that night's 11,000-foot camp.

A final descent the next day climaxed in a celebration of singing and dancing and presenting of certificates.

Three more days on a Serengeti safari photographing black rhinos, warthogs, leopards, lions, hippos, giraffes, zebras and Cape buffalo … Forty-two hours in jets and airports.

Finally, Nye was back on Big Mountain, peering through his living room windows at a summit one-third the height of where his boots had just been.

Still, he talked of the volcanic rift valley half a world away.

NYE SPENT most of his life near Philadelphia, but worked eight summers on the cog railway outside Mount Washington, N.H.

College was at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, followed by Jefferson Medical College and residency in Philadelphia. He completed his fellowship at University of Kentucky, then conducted his entire cardiology practice in Norfolk, Va. He also was a professor of medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School.

As trustee of Physicians for Peace, he traveled extensively to provide care and physician training, primarily in the Middle East. He sat on the board of governors of the American College of Cardiology.

After 26 years, Nye retired to Whitefish. Finally settled not far from the Eureka home of Louisa's grandmother, both he and his wife poured their energies into the community they had been visiting since 1983.

He calls his volunteer firefighting and incoming presidency on the board for the Big Mountain Fire Department a selfish move.

"I've seen too many people retire and go to beautiful places and have health problems," but have no medical help nearby, he said. "We're lucky to have this 24-hour service right here."

He's been secretary, vice president and is incoming president of what he calls a great organization, The Glacier Institute - and hauled its branded water bottle to the top of Kilimanjaro. He's working hard to improve facilities at its Big Creek Outdoor Learning Center, where children learn to love and respect nature.

Piggybacking with Louisa's vice-presidency of the Whitefish Theatre Co. board, he started helping with sets and lighting and has acted in two plays.

"When you're around the building, it's totally enticing to get into more," he said.

He's a ski ambassador for the Big Mountain resort, and he volunteers with the Flathead Valley Spay and Neuter Task Force. Tuesdays are devoted to a mountain-hiking group.

GIVEN HIS penchant for remaining active, the Kilimanjaro excursion was a natural next step.

"I did it for the personal challenge, to see if I was fit," Nye said. Only 85 percent who start the six-day hike finish at the summit. "It's not just the hike, it's the altitude. Some can't acclimate that fast."

He did it for the grandeur of it, taking in the impressive southern ice fields and the neighboring 15,000-foot Mount Meru poking its distant cone up through clouds blanketing the Ngorongoro Crater.

And he did it for the mental challenge.

Spanish moss, monkeys, baby leopards, wild dogs, spitting cobras, green mambas and the local Chagga people on the lower forests and the Masai in the higher game land, all inhabited the trails they followed. High above, though, he came face to face with his will to succeed.

If he were to go again, he would take boots and other gear to leave with the porters who cluster at the trailhead daily in hopes of getting the $8-a-day job.

And he just might.

"I would do it again with the right group," Nye said. "You do it to share the experience. It's something you want to do with someone you have a camaraderie with."

"I thought it was one of the most emotional accomplishments of my life," Nye said, comparing it to other experiences before and after moving to Whitefish. "It's all part of the psyche of being out here."

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com