Judy Colbert, ASJA, SPJ, AFTRA, SAG

From a walk in the woods to a fairway shot from a wood, from a dazzling display of stars not hidden by light pollution to surfing on water instead of on a computer, Massanutten Resort has grown as a four-season vacation getaway since 1971, when it opened as a golf and skiing facility.

Set in the Shenandoah Mountains, it's about a three-hour ride from Howard County, although you can dawdle to your heart's content on your way down (or home), stopping by the Route 11 potato chip factory or the Meems Bottom covered bridge. You can explore Endless Caverns and other cave formations can be explored, and enjoy music with a picnic dinner.

Visiting Massanutten starts when you leave the interstate traffic. You're surrounded by trees and mountains and scenes that fill illustrated calendar pages.

The resort is huge. In the 3,500-acre-huge category, with accommodations, recreation facilities and meeting spaces tucked here and there along streets that aren't stick-straight, but not quite bendy enough to be meandering.

Massanutten is a timeshare facility, so fully furnished rental units, for four to 12 people, are available. Packages, including golf in April and May (with a $5 greens fee to either course) or the WaterPark in June and July (admission privileges to the WaterPark) are promoted seasonally. However, even when specials are not advertised on the Web site, you can request one when you talk to the reservation department.

The delight or bane of a vacation in a timeshare that has kitchen facilities is it's so easy to prepare some or all of your meals with just a few groceries from the resort store or nearby providers. This is a vacation? Well, yes. Massanutten offers five dining choices including the Blue Ridge Buffet, a country-style buffet at the top level of the WaterPark (with views of the Blue Ridge Mountains or the splashing below); Hideaway Lounge, a bar and lounge on the middle floor of the WaterPark (HD TVs, and a light bar menu); Java Island, a coffee shop; Snackers (requires WaterPark admission); and Sweetz Candy Shoppe (fudge, candies, apples, beverages). Several good country restaurants are within a few miles of the property.

Hotel accommodations also are available, with mid-week and seasonal rates. The rooms are limited on weekends and holidays because that's when potential timeshare buyers are treated to their "free" vacation.

Massanutten is in the Shenandoah Mountains, and you can spend endless days contentedly doing nothing. But with as many as 170 activities per week (some are offered seasonally), one can keep plenty busy without ever leaving the property. You can play golf, basketball, table tennis or tennis, ski, ride horseback, hike, enjoy aromatherapy, learn basic knitting or hip-hop dancing, make a basketry accent lamp, join a bingo game, participate in a murder-mystery dinner theatre, take a stress-reduction and relaxation workshop, surf the pipeline, take a yoga class or a Tai Chi sampler and tour Barboursville Vineyard and Horton cellars.

There's a fee for many activities, so an activity card ($69 for children 17 and younger, $99 per adult, good for one week) that allows you to participate for free or at a reduced rate might be worthwhile.

When the muscles can't take any more weekend sports activities, head to the spa for a massage or enjoy a facial. It's best to reserve your spa treatment when you book your reservation, or at least a week prior to your arrival. A new two-story spa is being built into the current Woodstone Meadows pro shop, which will move to a new facility by the driving range. Both are due to be completed by the end of the year.

Although you're deep in the wooded mountainside, the resort offers Wayport wireless Internet in all units and hotels, the ski lodge, WaterPark and Woodstone building. It's $9.95 for a 24-hour period or $55.95 a week. Cyber centers are located in the general store and the WaterPark at 35 cents a minute, by credit card.

Sports specifics

There are two 18-hole golf courses. The Woodstone Meadows course is designed with generous fairways and gently sloping greens (with some condo views on the front nine and some mountain views on the back) at the bottom of the mountain. It's basically an executive course, with nine par 3s, seven par 4s and two par 5s, for a par-65 on 5,065 yards. It has a course rating of 70.5 and a slope rating of 128.

Mountain Greens is the older course, a challenging 18 holes near the top of the mountain (how can one concentrate on golf with such gorgeous views?). It's a par-72 with a 70.5 rating and 119 slope rating.

Both courses are open all year and each has a pro shop.

Water activities abound at WaterPark, an indoor-outdoor facility that is open all year (the indoor part) with eight water slides, frog pond (kiddie area), a wave pool, mat racers, adventure river and a wave surfer. It looks like Rube Goldberg took a humongous erector set and decided to assemble something fun. It worked.

The outdoor water area (open Memorial Day through Labor Day weekend) is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. It has a wave pool, mat racer and an activity pool.

Skiing starts in early December and runs through mid-March with six lifts, 14 trails (1,110-foot vertical drop), 70 skiable acres and snow tube park, and two snowboarding terrain parks. Massanutten was the first resort in Virginia with a quad lift, the first to offer snowboarding and the first to light all trails for night skiing.

A Virginia fishing license is required for anyone age 16 or older to fish on or off the resort. Five-day ($16 for nonresidents) passes may be purchased year-round at The Market at Woodstone. Licenses may be purchased in spring, summer or fall at the General Store near the Ski Lodge.

Fishing is allowed in the resort's two ponds, which are stocked 10 times a year with rainbow trout. There's no limit on the trout size, a 12-inch minimum on bass, and a 5-inch minimum on bluegill. There's a four-fish-per-person-per-day limit. There's no minimum or limit on all other fish. Rental equipment is available, starting at $3 for two hours.

For reservations and information, call 540-289-9441 or go to www.massresort.com