The Highground's Veteran's Retreat this Weekend
Monday, July 9th, 2018 -- 11:14 AM
-The Highground is holding their Veteran’s Retreat Weekend once again.This is the 2nd year The Highground is holding this event. It will be July 13th-15th. I spoke with the General Manager of The Highground, Jon Weiler, and he explained the Veteran’s Retreat in more detail.
"It's a really, really unique event. It encompasses everything we do at The Highground and why we do what we do. It's our healing. It's our education. These veterans that come in, and many of these guys never really had an opportunity to deal with other veterans, spend some quality time with them. So, basically how this happens is it's a Veteran's Retreat and, there's no cost to any veteran of any era, to come in and sit down and have a retreat. And we don't want to call it a retreat. It's a gathering. And, again, there's no cost. That's the biggest thing. I will even bring veterans in. I'm bringing someone in from Rhinelander. I'm picking them up from Rhinelander and I'm bringing them here because they don't have transportation. It's important for us to try to get to these veterans in whatever way we can to help them and help them understand they're not alone. A lot of veterans feel like they're the only one feeling this way and they're not. They need to get to this type of thing [the retreat] to see that."
Jon also talked about the events happening during the retreat.
"It's completely covered and begins on Friday. Check in around 2pm and we've got many things going on. A bonfire in the evening, dinner here at the American Legion in Neillsville, completely covered. There's a lot of different things that go on Friday evening, but you check in around 2pm and then just relax. Nothing major is happening Friday evening."
"Saturday morning we get up early and have a fishing trip to Mead Lake. Again, you don't need to bring any fishing supplies, everything is donated. And then we'll come back to the campsite Saturday afternoon. We'll have lunch. We may even do a shore lunch. Then we come back and we've got some events that go on Saturday afternoon. But, it's primarily the mission of getting these guys together and sitting down and talking and spending time with other veterans."
"Then Sunday, we have some events going on. We'll go back up to The Highground Sunday afternoon. We'll do some things there. We'll have lunch out there. There's a lot of things that are going on. It's completely covered. A lot of veterans don't want to be a part of something where they have to sit down and speak with someone. You don't have to do that. Getting out, being with these other veterans, experiencing the wilderness, that's what we're going to be doing. Giving our veterans an opportunity to heal."
Finally, Jon explained what he hopes veterans take away from the retreat.
"I hope that they take away in realizing that they're not the only ones suffering and dealing what they're dealing with. That's the most important. Making sure they understand that."
Once again, the Veteran’s Retreat is happening July 13th-15th and it’s completely free to veterans of all eras.
Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.