About
Happy Trails for Kids offers overnight camp experiences where campers take part in activities such as canoeing, swimming, archery, hiking, stargazing, rock climbing, climbing a rock wall, and singing campfire songs. The program includes overnight summer camps and other year-round outdoor adventures for youth in the Southern California foster care system.
• Ages: 7–18 years old
Happy Trails for Kids is dedicated to bringing camping, connections and confidence into the lives of boys and girls growing up in foster care. The program invites children ages 7 through 18 to explore the great outdoors and creates a year-round community where childhood is celebrated and friendships flourish. It offers year-round reunion events, weekly extracurricular programs, and older youth initiatives, and its motto is “once a camper, always a camper.” The Camping Program serves over four hundred foster children throughout Southern California and provides exciting and fun-filled overnight camp experiences for children in the foster care system.
The program operates under the supervision of an experienced Camp Director and a team of trained and enthusiastic counselors. Several staff members have successfully emerged from the foster care system, and the majority of counselors are former foster youth with personal experience in foster care. The leadership team includes Camp Director September Sucher, Trails To Success Project Manager Vincent Steven, Executive Director Lindsay Elliott, Founder Pepper Edmiston, Co-Founder and Board Member Susan Abrams, Board Chairman Jonathan Abrams, Board Secretary and Treasurer Mark Hikin, and Board Members Charlotte Hunt Harvey, Dr. Deanna Cooke, Erika Frank, Jeffrey Schwartz, Josh Pianko, Marci Gonzalez Rand, and Ronda Jackson.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a 133-acre deed for Happy Trails for Kids to transform a property into a permanent camp home. This new permanent camp on a 133-acre property is planned as a model campus for overnight camps and year-round recreational and educational programs for thousands of children in foster care.
Last updated March 14, 2026.
• Ages: 7–18 years old
Happy Trails for Kids is dedicated to bringing camping, connections and confidence into the lives of boys and girls growing up in foster care. The program invites children ages 7 through 18 to explore the great outdoors and creates a year-round community where childhood is celebrated and friendships flourish. It offers year-round reunion events, weekly extracurricular programs, and older youth initiatives, and its motto is “once a camper, always a camper.” The Camping Program serves over four hundred foster children throughout Southern California and provides exciting and fun-filled overnight camp experiences for children in the foster care system.
The program operates under the supervision of an experienced Camp Director and a team of trained and enthusiastic counselors. Several staff members have successfully emerged from the foster care system, and the majority of counselors are former foster youth with personal experience in foster care. The leadership team includes Camp Director September Sucher, Trails To Success Project Manager Vincent Steven, Executive Director Lindsay Elliott, Founder Pepper Edmiston, Co-Founder and Board Member Susan Abrams, Board Chairman Jonathan Abrams, Board Secretary and Treasurer Mark Hikin, and Board Members Charlotte Hunt Harvey, Dr. Deanna Cooke, Erika Frank, Jeffrey Schwartz, Josh Pianko, Marci Gonzalez Rand, and Ronda Jackson.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a 133-acre deed for Happy Trails for Kids to transform a property into a permanent camp home. This new permanent camp on a 133-acre property is planned as a model campus for overnight camps and year-round recreational and educational programs for thousands of children in foster care.
Last updated March 14, 2026.
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