If staying in West Vail south of the I-70, Cascade is closest. The Vail Red bus drops you off by the lift, with very little walking. This has been my "go to" lift for the past 20 years. Most of the time I get there when the lift opens. 99 percent of the time there is no line. However, last year, for the first time ever, I had to wait in a very long line when it snowed just 5-6 inches (same thing happened to me at Golden Peak; it definitely seems more crowded at Vail than it was before covid). The Cascade lift is old and slow but it gets you there. It takes you to the bottom of Chair 26, which also is uncrowded and is great for a warm up run on Simba. Simba is always freshly groomed in the morning. Lift 26 can lead you to the bottom of Lionshead (beware of long lines at the Eagles Nest gondola, though), or you can ski over to Lift 2 for some great groomers (but get there before 10:30 am before the ski instructors get there, which is typically when the lift starts to back up and have stoppages). My favorite thing to do is to take Cascade, go up 26, ski the Game Creek trail, take the Game Creek lift, and then head into the Sun Down bowl. From there I can stay ahead of the late arriving hoard and work my way west to east across the bowls, all the way to Siberia and Mongolia, in relative solitude, without long lines. There can be really nice, soft ungroomed snow if you stay in the bowls, and perhaps moguls, if that's your thing, especially in January. Going the way I do also can get you into Blue Sky when the lift opens, if you hustle. At the end of the day, I might ski to Golden Peak and take the in-town bus, take the elevator at the transportation center if I don't fell like walking up 3 flights of stairs, and transfer to the Vail Green bus. Very little walking this way.
