Iconic Boise Restaurant Announces Closing Date

The restaurant best known for serving up steamed clams by the bucket to hungry boaters coming home from Lucky Peak, will be turned into a 24-home subdivision.

Ben's Crow Inn, located just off the Greenbelt near the Sky Bar intersection, will close it's doors for good on Sunday, October 9th.  It's a decision that owner Ben Hamilton and his wife made back in early February when they decided that it was time to retire.  The tavern's business has also suffered in recent yeas because of the construction of Harris Ranch that at times blocked easy access to its parking lot.

Ben's has taken such good care of my friends and I on our yearly three mile run celebrating our friend Byron's cancer remission.  Every year we run from Lucky 13 to Ben's Crow Inn where they'd hook Byron up with a few cans of PBR to celebrate the occasion.  I'm bummed that it won't be there next year, so I took my dad and his girlfriend who are visiting from Ohio there for one last great seafood meal over the weekend.

So what's next for Ben's?  The Hamilton family has sold the land to Jim Conger, a developer who wants to turn the land into a subdivision.  It's an unpopular decision with the restaurant's neighbors.