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Rebuild EHC

Save the Date: August 19, 2023 – LightHouse Gala

Save the Date: August 19, 2023 – LightHouse Gala

This August, LightHouse invites you to attend our gala, An Enchanted Evening, to benefit the rebuilding of Enchanted Hills Camp (EHC). Held at the historic and beautiful Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco’s Union Square, our gala will be an elegant evening celebrating the blind community and raising funds for camp by sponsorships and both a silent and live auction.
 
Enchanted Hills is the heart and soul of LightHouse’s mission to promote the independence, equality and self-reliance of people who are blind or visually impaired. Camp is a safe place where blind, low vision, and deafblind campers of all ages can find community in a fun, educational and nurturing blind-positive environment. And, after the devastation from the 2017 Napa wildfires, we have made rebuilding and re-imagining EHC our top priority.
 
The proceeds raised at the gala will assist in the current and ongoing camp construction projects and future endeavors to enhance our enchanted redwood retreat to become an accessible, blind-positive oasis for generations of blind, low vision, and deafblind campers to come.
 
Stay tuned for more gala details and updates in the coming weeks! For now, you can learn more about sponsorship tiers, donating auction items, and purchasing tickets to the 2023 LightHouse Gala: An Enchanted Evening by visiting the LightHouse Gala website.

Read additional blog posts about the LightHouse Gala

We Celebrate Enchanted Hills Camp at the LightHouse Gala, August 19

Over a Thousand New Trees and Shrubs Planted at Enchanted Hills Over the Past Three-Day Weekend

Over a Thousand New Trees and Shrubs Planted at Enchanted Hills Over the Past Three-Day Weekend

Over this past Martin Luther King holiday weekend LightHouse and Enchanted Hills Camp hosted a three-day tree planting event. Volunteers joined EHC staff members and supporters—including Dan Kistler, our new lead in maintenance and landscaping at Enchanted Hills Camp—in planting over 1,000 trees and shrubs. From Saturday to Monday, over 60 volunteers of all ages got their hands dirty planting countless small plants and shrubs, as well as redwoods, maples, and monkey trees, just to name a few.

Two groups involved with the design of the New Enchanted Hills brought many dozens of employee volunteers to get their hands dirty and make a difference. LightHouse wants to thank the offices of Perkins-Will and RHAA Landscape Architects. We expect that planting a thousand trees will be an ongoing way to give back each MLK Day for years to come.

“We had a magical time with all of the groups of volunteers,” Dan Kistler tells the LightHouse Lately. “We were able to plant a little over a thousand trees and other species of plants to give back to the forest. I want to give a special thanks to everyone from LightHouse who helped out here, not only to make this possible, but to share this incredible experience.”

We are so excited for our campers to check out the beautiful new green additions to camp when our cabin doors re-open this summer. With that said, it’s almost time for EHC Summer 2022 registration! Keep an eye on your inboxes for more information about camp registration, or visit the Enchanted Hills Camp website for updates, information, and details.

Come and plant some trees at Enchanted Hills Camp

Come and plant some trees at Enchanted Hills Camp

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr Day on Monday, January 17, LightHouse and Enchanted Hills Camp in Napa are hosting a special tree-planting event! We have an ambitious goal of planting 1,000 trees and shrubs over the course of the weekend and would love your help.

We have places available on Saturday, January 15 and Sunday, January 16, and tree-planting will be from 9 am – 2:30 pm. RSVPs are required for each volunteer (not each household.) You can sign up to volunteer at:

Lunch will be provided to all volunteers who RSVP.

Unfortunately, we cannot provide transportation for this event.

A few requirements:

  • All volunteers are required to be age 14 or over
  • All volunteers are required to show proof of being fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or have a negative COVID19 test taken within the past 72 hours.
    • If you are fully vaccinated, we strongly recommend getting tested within 72 hours of arrival.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to volunteer@lighthouse-sf.org or 415-694-7320.

We look forward to a great weekend and to seeing you and your green thumbs at Enchanted Hills Camp on this upcoming long weekend!

Giving Tuesday is Here! Help Make Enchanted Hills Camp More Accessible and Sustainable.

Giving Tuesday is Here! Help Make Enchanted Hills Camp More Accessible and Sustainable.

Please join LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired and Enchanted Hills Camp on Tuesday, November 30 for Giving Tuesday, and help us meet our accessibility and sustainability goals!

This year the funds we raise on Giving Tuesday will go towards the purchase of two wheelchair accessible electric vehicle shuttles for Enchanted Hills Camp as a part of our larger vision to make EHC fully accessible and carbon neutral by 2030. The shuttles will be charged on site by our own solar array.

Donations will also go towards camperships to send 40 kids who are blind or have low vision to Enchanted Hills Camp next year.

Giving Tuesday is a global day of giving that kicks off the charitable season and end-of-year giving, and harnesses the generosity of people from around the world to bring about real change to the communities they know and love.

This is a philanthropic movement that connects diverse groups of individuals, communities and organizations around the world for one common purpose: to celebrate and encourage giving. LightHouse joined the Giving Tuesday movement in 2016 and continues to receive many very generous gifts from our diverse group of donors, volunteers, staff, board members and friends.

Please take part in this year’s Giving Tuesday on (or before) November 30 and consider a gift to Enchanted Hills Camp for the Blind. We sincerely thank Waymo for jump starting our 2021 Giving Tuesday with a very generous donation of $10,000.

Donate here to support LightHouse and Enchanted Hills Camp.

Things are going real “well” at EHC

Things are going real “well” at EHC

Thank you for joining us for the first two Enchanted Hills Camp Give Back concerts of the season! If you missed them, you can watch both on the EHC Facebook page.

Our next concert is taking place on Friday July 16 from 5:30 pm to 6:30 pm starring Mariana Sandoval Lintz.

This year our goal is to raise $20,000 for a new well at EHC.

A new well will allow us to be more self-sufficient and less reliant on water from our spring. The well will ensure that we have adequate water for campers without worry and enable us to store and pump water for the driest seasons. In the driest years, the spring has just barely covered our water needs during the busiest camp sessions. One year, alarmingly we had to truck in water. With a drought upon us once more, we sought to remedy this issue by prospecting for a new well. We did it! We struck liquid gold, in the form of H2O. The well production is estimated at 20,000 gallons of water per day which is enough to fill the EHC swimming pool daily.

Situated near the Rec Field, the new well will ensure that we have adequate water for campers. It will also enable us to take on projects never possible before such as leveling the Rec Field and getting rid of the ankle-twisting divots and bumps and irrigating the field for beep baseball, audible soccer and other team sports. Growing fruit trees and vegetable gardens that campers will tend will also be possible.

Great news! The five largest donors to this project will have the special honor of choosing names for EHC’s newest residents, five baby goats! Donate today to help us dig and erect this well, put in the pipes and pumps to carry the water where it is needed.

We are hoping to raise $20,000 to harness this precious natural resource and we need your help. You don’t need a ticket or even a Facebook account to enjoy these concerts, but we do need your support to help us sink this well.

You can also Support the EHC well project by purchasing an EHC tee-shirt. Or text any amount to give for the EHC well project to 415-707-7864.

Singalongs and Smores: EHC to Hold Virtual Kids Camp Starting July 5

Singalongs and Smores: EHC to Hold Virtual Kids Camp Starting July 5

Last week we brought you news about Enchanted Hills Camp’s (EHC’s) Adult Virtual Camp Session. It’s part of the multiple virtual sessions we are offering this summer, some at camp and some virtual, as we build back COVID-safe programs.

Well the good news continues; EHC is also offering a virtual camp session for elementary and middle schoolers!

The fun starts on July 5 and runs through Saturday, July 10 from 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm every day. Each day’s activities will be led by staff and counselors-in-training who are blind or have low vision.

But what are some of those activities? They include a virtual campfire, complete with smores, camp songs, music trivia, stories of EHC, origami and an EHC trivia contest.

But, wait you say, what’s this about smores? If you sign your children up for Youth Virtual Camp by Friday, June 25, you will be mailed a Camp Care Package which includes a braille and large print version of camp songs, and EHC wrist band, origami paper and yes, the ingredients to make those tasty smores.

Youth Services Coordinator Jamey Gump can’t wait for camp. “So many of our campers come from all over. I’m excited to welcome them to our youth session virtually where they’ll get the chance to deepen their connections to the EHC community,” he says.

What: Enchanted Hills Camp Youth Virtual Camp Sessions
Who: Elementary & Middle schoolers who are blind or have low vision
When: 4:00 pm to 5:00 pm daily from Monday July 5 through Saturday, July 10
RSVP: Jamey Gump at jgump@lighthouse-sf.org 415- 694-7372

Parents & Guardians: We’d love your help getting your children connected to our virtual program, however once they have joined, we ask that you please give them the space to participate individually.

First in Our Returning EHC Give Back Concert Series

First in Our Returning EHC Give Back Concert Series

Photo Caption: Derek and Shane Dittmar

Last year we brought you the Enchanted Hills Camp (EHC) “Give Back” summer concert series. Throughout the summer months when camp was silent, people from all over took part as best they could and listened online to an incredible array of performers who shared their talents to help support Enchanted Hills Camp. Well, it seems we may have started a new tradition, as the “Give Back” concerts are back, and camp director Tony Fletcher couldn’t be more thrilled.

“We are very pleased to once again offer a summer series of virtual concerts by musicians whose lives have been positively impacted by the programs at Enchanted Hills Camp. Our musicians will be raising funds to help us improve Enchanted Hills camp’s water storage.

“For three generations the camp’s parched recreation field lacked the summertime water to irrigate it and support a lush lawn. The rec field is the largest level sports area in our entire camp. Now we have a plan to develop a well water system which will keep the field green all year round. The pumps, storage tanks, well and other infrastructure costs approximately $25,000. We hope our community can raise that amount by September. Please join us for interviews and great music all summer long.”

The concerts will run every two weeks from June 18 to August 13. Up first on June 18 are brothers Derek and Shane Dittmar who are both blind playing original and cover songs: Derek on guitar and Shane on piano. Derek shared with us why he loves performing to support EHC, to which he feels a deep connection.

“I started as a camper at EHC around 2006. Every summer I couldn’t wait to fly out from Raleigh and spend a week in the mountains with my friends. I learned how to play sports, make music, maintain life-long friendships, and feel confident. EHC felt like home, and I was privileged to work as the Enrichment Area Leader in 2012 and 2013. The camp, its staff, and its energy will always be a part of me.

“EHC is special for a thousand reasons, but chief among them is that it presents the typical summer camp experience to people who don’t normally get that chance. Risk is something not often given to people with disabilities, so to have a place where I could be myself, completely and confidently, meant the world. I could experiment and explore and, when things were unexpected, find a way to redirect and fix them myself.  Staff was always there to help if I wanted, and to make sure that everyone was safe, but it was a chance to live my life on my terms and to learn who I was, both because of and in spite of my blindness.”

Derek started playing the bass guitar when he was eleven, “less because I had a pull towards bass and more because my incredibly talented brother was starting a band and that was the instrument, he didn’t have covered,” he laughs.

Now Derek is a civil defense attorney in Raleigh but playing and listening to music are ways in which he keeps himself grounded.

He’s keeping exactly what he’ll be treating us to on June 18 close to his chest.
“I perform original folk rock/Americana music. I currently plan on doing a few original songs written over the past two or three years, though I may throw a cover in, depending. My influences include Jason Isbell, Jackson Brown, Dawes, and Glen Hansard.”

Derek, we can’t wait!

The first EHC Give Back Concert with Derek and Shane Dittmar is on Friday, June 18 from 5:30 pm to 6:30 pm Pacific.

Where: Enchanted Hills Camp Facebook Page. No Facebook account is required and no tickets either. However, your contributions to the green rec field water system will go a long way to improve our rebuilding of camp so people like Derek and Shane continue to test boundaries and take risks there for years to come.

There’s no need to wait for the concert to give back to EHC. Donate via text by texting the amount you wish to give to 415-707-7864.

Support EHC with this Great Shirt. All funds raised will go directly to LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired.

Donate to EHC

You’re Invited: Virtual Grand Opening Celebration of Enchanted Hills Camp’s New Pool Bathhouse, November 14

You’re Invited: Virtual Grand Opening Celebration of Enchanted Hills Camp’s New Pool Bathhouse, November 14

Join us on our Enchanted Hills Camp Facebook page, on Saturday, November 14 at 12:30 pm for an architect-guided tour of the new pool bathhouse. A Facebook account is not required. If you tune in to the event, you’ll have a chance to enter a free raffle to win an Enchanted Hills Camp 70th Anniversary sweatshirt during the live celebration.

This summer, campers attended camp sessions virtually from the safety of their homes and we took this opportunity to accelerate the rebuilding of EHC after the 2017 wildfires destroyed half of the structures at camp. The rebuilt pool bathhouse follows the rebuilding of the camp storage barn and pool shade structure.

The new bathhouse will provide spacious shower and bathroom facilities for 64 campers using our interim canvas bungalows. It became vital to replace the pool bathhouse, to provide 24-hour access to showers, restrooms, a guide dog shade area and drinking fountains for campers. As an added safety feature, the pool bathhouse is designed with a locking sliding door to prevent access to the pool when a lifeguard is not on duty.

The bathhouse was designed by the architects at Perkins & Will, and built by Eames Construction. The building is clad in redwood lumber salvaged from the trees lost in the wildfires. As new cabins and program spaces are built, they will also have this beautiful and fire-resistant redwood exterior.

Come and join us.

What: Opening of the Enchanted Hills Camp Pool Bathhouse on Facebook Live

Where: LightHouse’s Enchanted Hills Camp Facebook page

When: Saturday, November 14 from 12:30 pm to 1:00 pm

If you are moved to contribute to our ongoing fire rebuild efforts, contact Jennifer Sachs, Director of Development, at JSachs@lighthouse-sf.org or 415-694-7333.

A look back at the EHC “Give Back” Concert Series

A look back at the EHC “Give Back” Concert Series

Tony Fletcher – Director of Enchanted Hills Camp

“My thoughts? I am genuinely satisfied with the results of the “Give Back” Concert Series. It felt authentic on so many levels. We captured the spirit of camp in terms of variety, fun and adventure. You just never really knew what would transpire with the live broadcasts. To me it was a combination of enthusiasm and anxiety, which is no different than what we expect from our campers and staff during a regular summer program at EHC. As Hoby Wedler [Sensory Innovation Director at Senspoint Design]. so eloquently stated years ago: ‘EHC is a safe place to be uncomfortable.’ “

Masceo Williams – Enchanted Hills Camp Enrichment Area Leader, who is blind

“For me, being part of a production team and being a performer was, like all things with EHC, giving and taking. It was 50% of giving my knowledge and trying to help and, in turn, 50% getting back information to help me as a performer in the virtual world. Experimenting with the production aspect and learning how to use Zoom and Facebook Live was all new for me. Learning to connect virtually with people from the LightHouse and the musicians was educational. Getting familiar with the technology climaxed really well with both the alumni showcase, which was really wonderful, and then the Bruce Cockburn concert, which was very cool. I learned as much as I hope that I was able to give.”

Mariana Sandoval Lintz – Opera Singer

“Performing for the EHC Virtual Concerts was a pleasure. As a musician, getting a chance to perform even virtually during these times is incredible. EHC is a beautiful place and I was happy to be able to do something to help with the rebuild.”

Cristina Jones – Opera Singer, who is blind

“Taking part in the concert series was a lovely way to substitute the time I was supposed to be spending in August as an EHC Music Camp Director. It gave me the opportunity to share music once again during these strange times, and it gave me the opportunity to work with people I wouldn’t have had the chance to work with otherwise. It goes to show that music definitely brings people together, even if we’re forced to stay apart.”

A huge thank you also goes to all the musicians and to everyone who watched. It’s the first time Lighthouse has used Facebook Live and we had over 15,000 views on the concert series. Thanks to all those who’ve donated so far to help make EHC the place to be.