A press release posted various places on the Internet yesterday suggests that Eneliko Sean “Liko” Smith is about to acquire Sugar Loaf Resort, the long shuttered ski resort in Leelanau County, Michigan. Smith is an enigmatic former Samoan boxer from Las Vegas whose failed business deals, relationship troubles and run-ins with the law have made quite a splash in the media. He admits that he doesn’t “Google well”.
A breath of fresh air may have descended on Sugar Loaf. Just weeks before snow is likely to fall on the downtrodden Leelanau County ski hill whose chairlifts have sat idle for nearly 12 years, a local resort owner is developing a plan that would open the mountain to cross-country skiing and ice climbing — perhaps this winter.
Leelanau County’s “elephant in the room”, the long-shuttered Sugar Loaf ski resort, is back in the news following a quiet autumn season after the eccentric Las Vegas boxer-turned-businessman Liko Smith returned to the West Coast empty-handed. Resort owner Kate Wickstrom has been courted in recent months by at least two suitors, including David Skjaerlund, from Owosso, near Grand Rapids.