Greetings from Hilltop. Phew! What a session. Even after doing this for 22 years, it’s always wild to me how this place can go from being full of life and energy for four full weeks to the campers being gone in a few hours and the counselors starting their time off. Many campers are already with their parents and guardians, and the rest are at the airport moving as smoothly as possible through their trip home.
The shift is remarkable, but that’s not really the point. The point is what has happened here at Four Winds over the past four weeks. It was truly a wonderful session. The campers fully embraced the spirit of what’s possible here at camp that can be so challenging in the outside world. They played, they challenged themselves, they connected with each other and their counselors. They made mistakes and recovered. They succeeded at things they weren’t sure they would, sensed themselves growing, and wanted more of that feeling. As we send them back home, there’s a little bit of regret that these things, which should be so normal in kids’ lives, are actually an aberration in our modern world. Despite that, these kids now have real experience and practice in connecting in those more old-fashioned ways. Those skills are by no means limited to these 160 acres. While those ways of connecting are a little easier here, given how we set things up, the skills are absolutely transferable to the outside world. The more these kids use those skills, the happier, more connected, more independent, and more responsible they’ll be.
I always advise parents to be ready for a range of reactions from their kids in the hours and days after returning home. Some will be immediately effusive with the songs and stories. Many parents love that, and if that’s the case, fantastic. Others might be a little bit more cagey. There’s something new and powerful about the fact that this experience is theirs, separate from their family experience. While, of course, parents want to hear all about their kids’ experiences, I’m sure you’ll also understand the desire of some kids to exercise autonomy by sharing what they choose, not necessarily everything.
Some will spend what might be an annoyingly long time on devices, communicating with camp friends or catching up on screen time. Others will just need a big nap.
Camp is a fully immersive experience, and transitioning out of it is often not like flipping a light switch. I promise, after a few days, your child will return to their normal self. Although hopefully with a little bit more independence, a little bit more confidence, a little more kindness, and a little bit more ability to move through the world. I make no promises, but we have even heard tell of campers coming home offering to clear the table for the first time. They’ve built up the habit here over the past four weeks.
We hope your camper is already dreaming about 2027, and we’re especially excited to welcome everyone back for our centennial summer. This year we’re doing registration a little differently: enrollment is open now, so if you’re ready, you can log into your parent account today and get your camper signed up.
We’ve also moved our returning camper guarantee deadline up, from November 30th to October 31st. We know that trims a few weeks off the usual decision window, and we don’t take that lightly. But we think it’s still plenty of time, and it lets us give new families a fairer, less rushed process this fall, clearer of the holiday crunch. No need to decide this second; we’ll send reminders as the school year gets rolling. But if you already know your camper is coming back for 2027 and you’d like to take care of it while camp is top of mind, you’re welcome to do so now. And don’t forget, the returning camper guarantee applies to siblings of returning campers as well.
Thank you, as always, for sending your children to Four Winds this session. We know that four-week camp is a fairly uncommon choice on the West Coast and that it’s a big sacrifice for families. We hope you’ll see the positive results in your campers now that they’re home, as we did while they were here. It’s been an honor and a pleasure to spend time with them here, and we can’t wait to see them all back next summer.