The Old Dillon Inn's Missing-R Sign Now Names a Bar Inside Bluebird Market

For years a glowing sign on the roof of the Old Dillon Inn read "BAR." Then the R burned out. According to the story on Bluebird Market's page for the new bar, co-owner Dave "Wabs" Walbert climbed a ladder to fix it, fell off, and decided the sign was fine as it was, since where he came from nobody said the R anyway. The sign already read "BA" by the time the inn closed in 2007.

Since early October 2026, that name has hung over the central bar at Bluebird Market. Joyce de la Torre and Michal Ulehla run the Old Dillon Inn inside the market, plus Bread & Salt and Bagalis in Frisco. They took over the food hall's central bar and called it The BA, as the Summit Daily News reported on Oct. 25. The bar is new, but it reaches back further than anything else at 325 Blue River Parkway. Silverthorne's best-known food hall has always had a 19th-century saloon at its center, and this fall that saloon started running the room everyone passes through.

A food hall built around a building that predates the town

The Old Dillon Inn building dates to the late 1800s, when Dillon still sat at its original site. In 1961, ahead of the flooding for Dillon Reservoir, the building was moved to what is now Silverthorne. The Old Dillon Inn's own account says the bartenders were pouring at the new site the same day it arrived. For decades it was the local spot for live country and bluegrass.

After former owner Bud Nicholson closed it in 2007, the building stayed largely untouched. Bluebird Market opened around it in January 2022. De la Torre told the Summit Daily News that the market's construction restabilized the inn's foundation and redid its roof. So for four years the market's oldest structure was preserved but closed, a historic shell sitting inside a busy new building.

That changed in January 2026, when the "Old DI," as de la Torre calls it, reopened after a nearly 20-year hiatus. The October takeover of the central bar carries the inn's identity out of its own walls and into the shared middle of the market. De la Torre gave the Summit Daily a short explanation in October: "Locals who used to come here will ask us, 'when's the bar coming back?'"

What survived the 18 dark years

The renovation kept the old room close to how Nicholson left it. De la Torre told the Summit Daily News that some regulars took mementos at the farewell party, "but mostly the place was left almost like what it was." The same March 2026 story listed what is still there:

• A long mahogany bartop that is said to date to the 1870s and to have come to Summit County by train
• Century-old oak floors
• A stray bullet hole on top of the bar, with no known origin
• Barstools tied to the floor, which de la Torre was told kept anyone in a fight from throwing them
• An original saddle-topped stool that has been there for at least five decades
• The "Good Food Priced Right" sign, which de la Torre credits interior designer Charise Buckley of Full Circle Designs with saving, and a "free beer tomorrow" sign behind the bar

The menu draws on the same history. Ulehla built it around the ranch and Mexican-restaurant roots of the old inn, with tacos, enchiladas, elk stew, garlic rosemary fries and a "cowboy spinach salad."

Two rooms, one set of owners

Now that the same owners run both the inn and the central bar, they are two ways into one operation rather than two competing bars. The figures below come from the inn's reported hours in March 2026 and The BA's posted hours, which the bar's page says are subject to change.

The bar's name shows up on the cocktail list too. The Missing R costs $14 and mixes Breckenridge Bourbon, sweet vermouth, Aperol and orange bitters. The BA is set up for watching games on a big screen, live music, and après drinks after a day on the mountain. The central bar is also available for private events, with beverage packages for gatherings at Bluebird.

The counters around the bar

Because The BA sits in the middle of the hall, a drink there goes with food from any counter in the room. Bluebird Market's Eat & Drink page currently lists Bread & Salt, Cloud City Confections, Ginger Palace, Melody's Trattoria, Fresh Press'd, Chef Daddy's Grill, Colorado Marketplace & Bakery, Lazo Empanada, Old Dillon Inn, Chimayo, Colorado Mountain BBQ, Lucky Bird and Summit Scoops.

The lineup has changed over the past 18 months. Ginger Palace opened in June 2025 in the space Crepes A La Cart left when it moved to Prospector Marketplace in Frisco, according to the Summit Daily News. Colorado Mountain Barbecue had its grand opening on Oct. 31, 2025, as a second counter from the owners of Colorado Marketplace & Bakery, the paper reported. Then came the Old Dillon Inn in January 2026 and The BA in October. Two of the market's newest additions are both run by the team behind its oldest building.

December on the same stretch of Blue River Parkway

The BA's 11 a.m. weekend opening and its weeknight hours line up with a full December calendar on the same street.

1. Reply All Improv Comedy, Nov. 13 to Dec. 11. Theatre SilCo runs the improv series at The Henry Studio, 460 Blue River Parkway, starting the night after this post publishes.
2. Holiday Lighting & Art Market, Friday, Dec. 4, 4:30 to 8:30 p.m. December's First Friday comes to the Pavilion at 400 Blue River Parkway, with the tree lighting at 6 p.m., plus Santa, live music and carolers.
3. A Tuna Christmas, Dec. 4 to 23. Theatre SilCo's holiday show opens the same night as the lighting, at the CVA Flex Theatre, 460 Blue River Parkway.
4. Holiday Art Market, Saturday, Dec. 5, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The Town of Silverthorne lists a second market day at the Pavilion.

The Town of Silverthorne's event listing for the Dec. 4 lighting has the full program. The tree goes up on the same parkway as the Old Dillon Inn, which poured its first drinks in Silverthorne the same day its building arrived in 1961. On lighting night, a Friday, The BA's posted hours have it open from 11 a.m.

Places like the Old Dillon Inn are part of what gives a mountain town its character, and they come up often when I talk with people about Silverthorne. If you're weighing a second home or rental property near Blue River Parkway and want a local read on what's changing along it, Tanya Delahoz is happy to help. Request a Personalized Market Consultation, and we can start with a drink at The BA.