The premier ski resort in North America, according to Ski and Snow Country magazines, the Whistler/Blackcomb complex boasts more vertical, more lifts, and more ski terrain than any other ski resort in North America. And it isn't all just downhill skiing: There's also backcountry, cross-country, snowboarding, snowmobiling, heli-skiing, and sleigh riding. In summer, there's rafting, hiking, golfing, and horseback riding. The area got the ultimate seal of approval from the International Olympic Committee in 2003 when it landed the opportunity to stage many of the alpine events for the 2010 Winter Games. So come now to test yourself on the same slopes that tomorrow's champions will ski on.Back in the 1970s, the city fathers, having made a conscious decision to build a resort town, looked to their minions in the planning department and ordered them to make it so. The result is Whistler Village -- a resort town of 40,000 beds, arranged around a central village street in a compact-enough fashion that you can park your car and remain a pedestrian for the duration of your stay.What was sacrificed in this drive to become the perfectly planned community was space for the odd, the funky, the quaint, and the nonconforming. Whistler has none of the strip malls, cheap motels, and gas stations that mar some resort towns -- but neither will you run across that quaint little restaurant run by an old Tyrolean couple, tucked away on an out-of-the-way hillside.The towns north of Whistler, Pemberton and Mount Currie, are refreshment stops fo\r cyclists and hikers and the gateway to the icy alpine waters of Birkenhead Lake Provincial Park and the majestic Cayoosh Valley, which winds through the glacier-topped mountains to the Cariboo town of Lillooet.