A Sanibel cafe owner was ‘crushed by what I saw’ after Hurricane Ian. Can he rebuild?

The place settings almost look ready for the next customer.

The glass salt and pepper shakers stand proud next to a plastic bottle of hot sauce. The utensils, folded in paper napkins, are ready to scoop up the omelet special — turkey, broccoli, fresh mushrooms, cream cheese, topped with homemade hollandaise sauce.

Then there is what’s surrounding the set table. The rest of this Sanibel restaurant is a wreck.

‘This is a tough one’

Dan Billheimer, the Lighthouse Café’s owner, has seen it.

He is among the islanders starting to pour into their property to see firsthand what Hurricane Ian did two weeks ago, when the storm rained hell on some of Southwest Florida’s most pristine locales.

Billheimer, managing a few visits to the family restaurant, is one of thousands in Lee County neighborhoods including Sanibel, Captiva, Pine Island and Fort Myers Beach, as well as Naples in Collier County, who now have to decide on rebuilding their homes, their businesses, their lives.

Many won’t get to decide. Hurricane Ian has caused at least 115 deaths in Florida, according to state and county authorities. Billheimer, whose family has lived on Sanibel for three generations, realizes the magnitude of what that means.

“The aftermath of Hurricane Ian is also a great lesson in humility,” he said. “My family and I have been very fortunate to have amazing people to take us in, advocate on our behalf, and encourage us to keep moving forward. I do not have to go far to find someone who has it so much worse, so I try to stay humble and give as much as I can.”

Billheimer also wasn’t kidding when he responded to a query about two photo albums he had posted to his Lighthouse Cafe of Sanibel Facebook page after the hurricane, a more destructive force than the one dealt by Hurricane Charley in 2004.

In the first post, on Oct. 6, Billheimer mourned the loss of what the Lighthouse Café once was.

“Lots of positive vibes and prayers from Connecticut being sent your way,” wrote customer Lori Bee to that post. “I swear, if all of us came down and gave back some of the love you’ve shown us, we’d put Ty Pennington to shame and have that cafe up and running in 3 days flat!” she said, in a reference to the host of the home improvement program “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” which ran on ABC for 10 seasons through 2012.

In the most recent post almost a week later, on Wednesday, such local reaction gave Billheimer new hope, more pep.

Still, “this is a tough one,” he told the Miami Herald as he began to tell his story, which is also the story of a Florida local landmark.

Since the mid-1950s, the Billheimer family has owned and operated restaurants on Sanibel, he said. The Lighthouse Café has been in the family for 38 years.

Billheimer, 48, was 14 when he took his first job at the Lighthouse Café in 1987, coinciding with when his uncle Michael bought the place. That’s when he pinpoints growing up alongside the restaurant.

Billheimer, in turn, bought the Lighthouse Café from his uncle in September 2019, and steered it through a massive red tide, the COVID-19 pandemic and now Ian, he said.

The ugly telltale water line ringing the restaurant’s walls at the six-foot mark can give one pause when looking at the photo of that lonely table with the silverware still in place.

“Having that deep seated connection with the Café, it was truly heartbreaking when I visited it for the first time after the storm,” Billheimer said. “I told myself to expect the worst, but nothing can prepare you for that. I was crushed by what I saw.”

The Lighthouse Café took about 5 feet, 10 inches of water from the storm surge, he said, and it destroyed almost everything.

About 60% of the Lighthouse pictures that people had been giving the family for decades were unrecoverable. “But 40% was,” he said.

“Random things, like a small table that was still set with utensils, salt and pepper, and hot sauce but silted in with mud, were just surreal to see. The more I investigated, the deeper the shock at the loss of not only my livelihood, but of this place that was an extension of me. It was a very tough day,” Billheimer said.

In addition to the business loss, Billheimer said the home he shared with his wife and two daughters was also lost to the storm, as were two cars.

But now that he’s started the cleanup process on the business site, he says he has found a way to envision a new Lighthouse Café.

That optimism hasn’t gone unnoticed.

“Your positivity is inspiring. Can’t wait till we can be back for our breakfast after our sunrise beach walk,” customer Kathy Monahan-Rial wrote.

The building requires a total gut renovation. The Lighthouse Café employs a staff of 19 and some of them and their families have lost their homes, too. Given all that Southwest Florida has to set right, the restoration will be a long time coming, Billheimer realizes.

Cousin Brook Barnhart started a GoFundMe for Lighthouse Café Hurricane Relief on Sept. 29. As of Wednesday, the initiative had raised $18,300 with a $10,000 goal.

“Throwing out ovens and refrigerators was sort of cathartic,” Billheimer concedes. “Neighbors are pitching in and encouraging us. A very ‘Sanibel Strong’ vibe is starting to permeate the island.

“Even though it will take a lot of time and a herculean effort to reopen, I am motivated by all these future possibilities,” he said. “I have been able to grieve and mourn the old Lighthouse Café, and now it’s time to look forward. The aftermath of Hurricane Ian is a great lesson in problem-solving.”