Ski Inn comes down

On a blustery day in early December 2013, at about 2:20 p.m., a heavy gust of wind uprooted a towering ponderosa pine that stood next to the Ski Inn on Cascade Avenue in Sisters, sending the trunk crashing through the front of the restaurant.

Mike Smith of Sisters was eating at the counter when the tree came through the roof. He said, "Just boom! Like a bomb went off. (Stuff) just flew everywhere, blew me off my stool."

Smith reported that there were about a dozen staff and patrons in the restaurant; all escaped serious injury.

The iconic old-time Sisters restaurant never got up and running again. The site became something of an eyesore along Sisters' main thoroughfare.

In the summer of 2016, a handful of guerilla artists "jean bombed" the building in the run up to the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show, wrapping the building in a "quilt" of jeans. The art whimsically gussied up the damaged and decrepit building - for a while. But, as denim does, the art installation eventually faded.

Last year, the site's new owner, Jim Yozamp, heeding the concerns of Sisters citizens, painted the building to make it less of an eyesore.

And on Tuesday morning, Yozamp brought in a demolition crew headed by Gerry Tewalt to finally take the old, damaged building down.

Yozamp, owner of PacWest Builders, LLC told The Nugget that information on what will be built on the site will be available as the planning process gets underway.