I know this has been done, but 1. I'm too lazy to look for old threads and 2. I love discussing this stuff over and over. I've been planning my Smugg's trip a week before Christmas this year and was thinking about tune up ski days and where to go. Tline has been my favorite over last few years but I'm starting to want to hit some different terrain. What I was wondering is what are folk's fun run combination. Not necessarily hardest or extreme but the one that just puts a smile on you face and you love to hit as a standby feel good kind of fun run. At Tline I always like to hit upper dew drop or Almost heaven and just carve my way down to the mid point. Then I like to cut into the glades and follow it down to the lift area. Never fails to make me smile.

Bumps, since your from Fredericksburg how about some Old Dominion suggestions: Paradice and Diamond Jim at Massanutten? Never much of a crowd on that quad chair that serves them. You can also pound a lot of vertical with numerous nice combos off the Highlands Express at Wintergreen.
This old piece had more suggestions of this type from me and others: http://www.dcski.com/articles/view_article.php?article_id=357&mode=headlines

BTW, have you been to Smuggs before? It's a dang good mtn. Hope they have a lot open by the time of your visit. I skied 4 days in one week there once and didn't get bored. And they have a REAL steep area called Doc Dempseys Glades or something like that.

Jim thanks for the link. I go to Smugglers at least every other year. I have a time share there. We went on a whim at least 10 years ago no now and had such a great time we decided that it was worth buying a time share there. Wife loves it and she doesn't ski. I like the ski instructution, last few years they started a adult "camp" which is designed to take you out and push your abilities to the next level. It was in one of these camps where I first ventured into the woods. Couple years ago I decided to try it. We sat down at the beginning of the week and discussed where I would like to be at the end of the week. We did an anlysis of my equipment and quickly decided that it would not take me where I wanted to be. As part of the camp you get a fre demo day and if you use demos for the week and decide to purchase a set of skis the cost of the demos come off the skis, so you can try as many different lenghts and types as you want. I also get an owner discount which makes it even more attractive, so once I decided to upgrade, I had a blast. But the real key was the attention to all aspects of my skiing which got me to "break through" from groomed blacks to move onto moguls and glades with confidence. First part of the week we worked on carving, quick turns, and slip slidding in all situations. Moved to bumps and worked on leg motinon, quiet upper body and picking your line. Glades wasn't even on my objective list. But about Thursday we came upon a gladed area and we staopped and My instructure said "I know you can do this, Do you think your ready?" Apparently getting older hasn't made me a lot smarter and I said sure. I don't think It wasn't even a real trail just one the locals had started running. The I was jumping around trees more than turning, We poped out onto a steep portion of a bumped up black run and ran those to the bottom. I don't know who was happier? Me or my instructer.

hhhmmmm favorite run combo...locally I love taking the Canaan ski area lift to the summit (one time pass for five bucks) then slipping out the "back door" of the resort, cruise down pipeline and into the National Forest, around Baldy, down Springers (Whitegrass land), then shuffle back to my car over at Canaan. Can do it in an easy half day or tack on some touring for a 3-5 day jaunt.

Steve

If you are going to be in VT over Christmas and if there is abundant natural snow, I'd suggest a day at Mad River. The most classic fun run there IMHO is Antelope end to end. The top 1/3 or so is blue with great views and the twists and turns that New England skiing was once famous for. The bottom is black and bumped but never steep. It also twists and turns and takes you far from the main system before looping back. Take your time, stop amd enjoy the winter views and the quiet. You can stop for 5 minutes or more in complete silence and no other skiers will come by. You can also get untracked powder on the edges for a week after a storm. Done properly it takes a good 20 minutes to ski Antelope end to end. It requires solid intermediate or better skill (you do not need to be expert) and samples a bit of everything that makes Mad River great. At the bottom there is a short traverse/bushwack on the left that gets you back to the single chair. If you miss it you often get to make first tracks on a nice final pitch leading down to a service road, then take off your skis and walk about 200 yards left on the road to return to the lift.

Interactive trail map,
http://www.madriverglen.com/maps/iMapLarge.php
Move your mouse over numbers 9 and 30.

For more of a cruising experience forego lower Antelope, cross under the single liftline on Broadway then take Bunny or Porcupine. All the trails in Birdland are delightful cruising and many experts go there in the afternoon after they have trashed their legs on the tough stuff.

3-5 day Jaunt? Interesting. whats the logistics like for this?

Thanks, Denis. WIth family I'll probably hang at smuggs the entire week, but Mad River Glen has been on my list of want to go to places for last year or so. Funny you bring it up, I was just reading an article and some adverisements in ski vermont mag. and had gone out to the website yesterday. I am thinking of going there for a long weekend. BTW, I remember a thread of a PA resort which is said to have a MAd River Glen feel to it. I thought it was Blue Knob, but looking at a few recent posts on Blue Knob I'm not sure.

I don't think I can tack together a fovorite run combo because the runs that make me smile the most are the ones that are completely random and vary up a lot. Last year at Snowbird I had a little of that where we were bombing a trail, I took the lead and would dive off the trail into the trees cruise through as smooth and fast as possible then fly back onto the trail for a bit then bomb back into the woods again. I just love that kind of flowing varying terrain. Around here 7 Springs is the only place I've been that lets me do that. I need to get to TLine this winter and try it, might offer me the same buzz. Riding that way is also why I'm horrible at trail names unless I ride there a lot. I'm more likely to say things like "lets take the black run that drops back to the lift by the..." I know it takes longer but thats just how I like it.