George S. Weber, 83, surgeon and globe trotter

When George S. Weber and his group completed their climb to the summit of the Matterhorn in the Swiss Alps in the 1950s, "he felt extremely blessed," a daughter, Ann Weber-Ammar, said.

During such outdoor adventures, he told her later, "he had a sense of tremendous freedom and communion with God."

He certainly felt blessed, she said, when learning later about another party climbing at the same time, a group in which "someone did not make it to the top and fell to their death."

On Sunday, May 3, Dr. George S. Weber, 83, a Woodbury resident for more than 40 years and a former surgeon at what is now Inspira Medical Center, died of complications from dementia at Kennedy University Hospital in Cherry Hill.

Dr. Weber did not limit his adventures to his youth.

In 1999, the year he turned 68, he hiked to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, with his wife, Gunnlaug, accompanying him part of the way.

In 1980, his daughter said, he white-water rafted with a group down a stretch of the Colorado River.

And in the 2000s, he and his wife trekked through the valleys below the Himalayas.

"A lot of traveling began after Dad retired from surgery," his daughter said.

Born in Reading, Dr. Weber graduated from Wyomissing High School in 1949, where he was a quarter-miler on the track team and competed on its four-man mile relay team.

That relay team won the Pennsylvania state championship in its small-school class as well as the mile relay for its class at the Penn Relays, both in 1949, Dr. Weber's younger brother, Edward, said.

After earning a bachelor's degree in chemistry at Princeton University in 1953, Dr. Weber graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1957.

In college, Edward Weber said, his brother was on the track team only as a freshman, but "he played on the marching band for four years; played the trumpet."

At Princeton, his daughter said, "he loved all the interesting things like art and literature" but had to study sciences because he wanted to become a physician.

His strategy for getting through science homework, she said, was "head to the lightbulb" - pressing his forehead to a lamp to keep him awake.

As an Army medical officer, he served at what is now Army Garrison Stuttgart in West Germany. He then studied vascular surgery under Michael DeBakey at Baylor University College of Medicine in Houston, where he was a fellow in cardiovascular surgery.

At what is now the Inspira Medical Center in Woodbury, he was a staff surgeon from the mid-1960s to the late 1980s, his daughter said, and he "pioneered vascular surgery" there.

But adventures continued to help define him.

In the 1990s, he hiked along a section of the Great Wall of China with his wife and his mother, Ellen, who had given them the trip as a gift.

Robert and Mindy Mast had known Dr. Weber since they all were teenagers.

"We loved sailing with him," Mindy Mast said, whether in the Caribbean in the 1970s and 1980s or among the Greek islands in the 1990s.

"He was a very charismatic, energetic, 'hail fellow well met' fellow," she said.

In addition to his daughter, wife, and brother, Dr. Weber is survived by another daughter, Helen Weber-Cetkovic; five grandchildren; and a great-grandson. Daughter Karin Lynn Weber died in 2014.

Visitation was set for 10 to 11 a.m. Tuesday, May 12, at the Presbyterian Church, 67 S. Broad St., Woodbury, before an 11 a.m. funeral there, with interment in Eglington Cemetery, Clarksboro.

Donations may be sent to the Alzheimer's Association, Suite 310, 3 Eves Dr., Marlton, N.J. 08053.

Condolences may be offered to the family at www.earlefuneralhome.com.