The reopening of an iconic backcountry lodge has been pushed to next summer. As KBSX reported last year, the rebuilding of Big Creek Lodge near the Frank Church Wilderness is led by a group of hobby pilots who use the airstrip in the same location.
Colleen Back of the Idaho Aviation Foundation can’t help but use flying analogies when she talks about the progress and setbacks with the Big Creek Lodge this year.
“Despite the headwinds," says Back, "we’ve had so much good news too and we are just jazzed coming into the last part of the building season and then going into next year.”
Back says complications with logistics in getting building materials and construction volunteers to the remote location held things up. It takes about six hours to drive to the lodge from Boise.
But she says the tailwinds have come in the form of donations in the past month, including $100,000 from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Foundation. Back says the plan now is to open the lodge by mid-summer in 2017, and will be open to the public for rental.
Find Frankie Barnhill on Twitter @FABarnhill
Copyright 2016 Boise State Public Radio
