Aug. 6, 2003 - ALLENSPARK, Colo.--Nils and Denice Kristoffersen reluctantly are letting go of the mountain lodge they've transformed from a tourism-dependent money pit into a moneymaking machine.

Wild Basin Lodge will be sold at auction on Sept. 30 with bids beginning at $1.95 million.

When the Kristoffersens bought the lodge for $2 million in 2001, revenues were $297,000. But they've cultivated a lucrative wedding business and developed a staff that works like it owns the place, and this year, the lodge just outside of Allenspark will reap more than $1 million.

Now the couple must deliver their hospitality masterpiece to the next aspirant. Nils' mother is ailing, and, in a car accident, Denice suffered a severe leg injury that is not healing.

"It's so painful to let go, but on the other hand, I can't get back the last six months of my mother's life. I can't buy my wife a new leg," Nils said. "But I can always come back and buy another business." The couple has demonstrated prowess at turning around a business. With only six rooms in the lodge, the previous owners had toiled to make ends meet.

When Nils, 38, and Denice, 48, bought the property, they expected it would take three, maybe five years to break even.

"We came here, and we had a certain business criteria and a certain aesthetic criteria," said Denice of their multistate search for a remote lodge business where they could struggle amid beauty. "This met all our aesthetic criteria, and none of our business criteria. It was a diamond in the rough." They drilled deep into the gold mine that is the wedding business, creating memorable experiences for hundreds of stressed or blissful couples.

When they arrived, they had six weddings on the books. They expected to do 13 weddings in 2002, but did 35 instead. This year, they've already hosted more than 100 and have another 65 booked.

A young chef has flourished under the Kristoffersens' management, and the lodge restaurant has earned high accolades from Gourmet and Bon Appetit magazines.

"This is a turnkey business. It's not a diamond in the rough anymore," Nils said. "It's going to keep growing. The challenge for whoever comes in will be to moderate the growth. It's certainly outgrown us." The couple has expanded the lodge's livery, opened a deli, spruced up the bar, remodeled the rooms and expanded banquet facilities to handle 240 guests. The lodge's restaurant has hosted as many as 2,000 diners in a weekend.

"I think the most important concept here is that this is not a strictly tourism-driven business," said Jim MacDonnell, director of Sheldon Good & Company Colorado, the auction firm marketing the Wild Basin Lodge.

"The growth of their wedding and special-event business has been phenomenal. They are busy from Valentine's Day through New Year's," he said.

Early this summer, a woman knocked on the Wild Basin Lodge's front door before it opened for dinner. She asked if she could just sit on the back porch for a few moments. She promised she wouldn't bother anyone.

She sat quietly, gazing beyond the formidable Mount Copeland. She wept.

A year before on that day, she had sat in that same seat with her husband, who had recently died. They had reveled in the beauty of Rocky Mountain National Park a few steps away. They had nuzzled to the bubbling sounds of the St. Vrain River below the deck.

"We all started crying," said Nils, grasping his wife's hand as they took in the same vista. "God, that was so rewarding."

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(c) 2003, The Denver Post. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.