A Fantastic Escapade and More in Tucson!

I’m not even sure where to begin. Escapade was a jam-packed week with us often running from one event to another. All of the activities were fun and/or informative, but there was very little time without something going on and usually multiple somethings! We had to pick and choose and quickly gave up trying to do it all. It would be impossible without an army of clones. Lol. Also, confessing right up front that several of the blog photos were unrepentantly stolen from the Escapade photo-sharing app. We loved being able to see everyone's shots and sharing was encouraged, so we added some and stole others. 😉

We are registered and ready to roll! 
Bob, Carole, Teddi and Roger

I won’t do a detailed rundown of each day, but I will try to give you an idea of the scope and variety of events. Let’s start with Sunday, 3/19, the first official day. We visited the Row, where different Chapters (regional groups), BOF’s – Birds of a Feather (shared-interest groups) and many of the Escapee Co-op RV Parks had booths. It is always interesting to see how varied the groups within Escapees are – everything from the Christian Mission group to the Nudescapers. (Note: everyone was clothed for this event. Lol.) We had already joined the Boomers and were delighted to see friends we’d met last year at Quartzite and Jojoba Hills.  We also made our first run through the Market Place which sold mostly RV-related items (plus one special vendor that I visited repeatedly – more about that in a bit!)

Check-In and the Row

Opening Ceremony was Sunday afternoon and immediately followed by a cupcake social (free treats!) and then a special social for 1st time Escapade attendees. A “social” is any gathering of Escapees where you can bring your own beverage and snack and just get to know folks and relax. We brought snacks to share and sat at a table with Bob and Carole and four other first-timers. We shared stories and got acquainted. We mentioned needing a housesitter during a trip in September. Laurie, who was at our table, said she might be interested. It turned out that she will be in the PNW and the timeframe fit with her travel plans. Later in the week she met both Raney and Riley and is going to visit in May. We were super thrilled. We didn’t come to the Escapade looking for a housesitter, but it looks like we may have found one!

The house was packed for the opening ceremony.

Hey look! We're on the big screen. 
(No, they were not airing America's Most Wanted. Lol)

The Cupcake Social - one of many opportunities to chat and consume carbs. 😁

Laurie and Raney.
We may have found our housesitter!

I’ve got to give the Escapees high marks for the nightly entertainment. We had amazing bands – country music with A Few Miles South, great rock and roll from No Reply (my personal favorite), and an incredible variety of acoustical covers from the Status Crowes. We also had a great show by Native Spirit featuring stories, native music, hoop dancing and lots of humor. Another highlight was the Escapee’s Got Talent show. Our emcee, Jim, was a master of the quick change and had a rainbow assortment of suits, he also had a non-stop repertory of jokes that had us alternately laughing and groaning. Lol.

 

Few Miles South had us boot-scooting to country tunes.

No Reply - most excellent rock and roll!

The Status Crowes bill themselves as an acoustical jukebox.
That is a credible claim given the huge variety of covers they did.

Native Spirit performance was educational and highly entertaining.

Escapees Got Talent was no lie.
Amazing talent and the emcee in a rainbow array of suits kept us laughing.

This is a crowd that likes to have a lot of fun, but they are also extremely generous. There were several fund-raisers for the CARE center that I mentioned before. In total, over $10,000 was raised. At the “Cupcakes for Care” event, 12 mini bunt cakes were auctioned off. None sold for less than $200 and the highest bid was $850! Consider it a donation for a great cause with a thank you cake. Wow. Another fun event was “Dip a Chip for Care”. Thirty-two Escapee teams made their favorite dip and we got to sample and vote with our dollars for our favorites. That event raised $2755, pretty much one dollar at a time. That’s a lot of dipping chips! Lol.  

 

What a generous bunch - hard to believe one of those sold for $850!

Dip a Chip for CARE was another tasty fundraiser.

In addition to community, another Escapees focus is education. With over 60 different seminars offered, we really had to be selective. Carole said if felt a lot like college, checking your schedule and rushing from class to class.  Some we attended together, other times we split up so we could cover different topics. We learned about trip planning, organization, the full-time RV lifestyle, boondocking and other options for camping, nutrition and fitness on the road and got lots of great info about traveling to Alaska and Mexico. Whew! I have about 22 pages of notes! There were hands-on craft and art activities too. Even though I am not at all crafty, the instructors were very patient and helpful. Check out the cute earrings and adorable gnome ornament I made! Lol.

I won't quit my day job, but I was happy with my efforts. Lol.

As I said, there was just so much going on there was no way we could even begin to do it all. But rumors fly and we heard that Silent Disco was not to be missed. The event was hosted by the Xcapers, a lifestyle group within Escapees created for working RV’ers, although anyone can join and all are welcomed. They have a great vibe and incredible energy. They hosted a Silent Disco event early in the week and it was such a hit they did a repeat. We had no idea what Silent Disco was, but knew we had to find out. Everyone is handed a pair of headphones with three color-coded music channels. You put them on and are suddenly in your own little world. Dance! Dance! Dance! It was fun to watch the colors change in a wave as a particularly good song came on and everyone switched to that channel. Never saw anything like it, but it sure was a blast! I thought we were too old to be Xcapers, but we had such a great time hanging out with them, I may have to reconsider.

 

Silent Disco - not to be missed!

Xcapers are an amazing bunch.

Another fun activity is people watching and looking at all the different types of rigs. The staff and volunteers do an incredible job and are highly entertaining too. We also connected with a couple of other National RV owners (the type of coach that both we and Bob and Carole have). Brian let us take a peak inside his Tropical and we talked upgrades and shared tips.

The parking crew know how to have fun on the job!

Rigs of every size and description.

Our mini National Owners Group. 

Notice anything different in that last picture? So, I did mention a certain vendor at the Market Place that I ended up visiting several times. Actually, at one point I was pretty much working her booth. Lol. Dawn is a representative of Beauty Inspired Concepts (BIC) and she sells wigs and hairpieces. When I first walked by, I thought that was a weird thing to offer at an RV event, but then I started talking with customers in the booth. They are perfect for traveling! One gal said she buys a new style every year. Another gal said she wears them dancing and I thought, dang she may be onto to something. My fine, thin hair drives me nuts when I’m doing the dog shows. I’ve been trying to come up with some solution, looking at hats and scarves… how about a new head of hair. Lol. They looked great on everyone else, so I tried one on. Honestly, I felt pretty ridiculous at first, but got so many compliments from total strangers that I started to really like the idea. I did some research before committing, but finally decided, why not?!  I chose a color close to my own hair in an easy to wear pixie. What do you think?

Rog says it looks a lot like the hairstyle I had when Rian was a baby. 

Another of the fun things at Escapade are the door prizes. Almost every evening there is a drawing before the nightly entertainment. Over $11,000 worth of merchandise and certificates were given out! Bob won a $250 gift certificate from one of the vendors. Another prize was $100 off at BIC, Dawn’s booth. I had my fingers crossed, but no love. Sigh. Then the next morning, Rog saw that it was posted on the Buy/Sell/Trade portion of the Escapade App. Randy, the person who’d won it, was giving it away. I quickly texted him and told him I’d be thrilled to put it to good use. Lol. So back to Dawn’s booth I went! This time I picked a bob in a silver color. If you’d have told me I would willingly “go gray”, I’d have said you were nuts. But the more I tried it, the better I liked it. So I said it again, why not?! What do you think?

Now this one is more of a stretch. 
But it's growing on me. Lol. 

With all the non-stop activities you may worry that the puppers were neglected. Fear not, while they did have more coach time than usual, we made sure they got lots of play sessions at the dog park and opportunities for sniff walks around the fairgrounds. Raney visited Ruby and you could hear Miss Thunderpaws racing after Ruby in their coach. We usually had dinner together in Bob and Carole’s coach since it was too cold and windy to be comfortable eating outside. We thought we’d have sunshine and heat in Tucson, but I haven’t put my warm coat away yet. In fact, we usually had on several layers, especially for the outdoor entertainment! Brrrrrrrr.   Speaking of dinners, there were food trucks at the Big Social on Thursday evening and we had our first Sonoran Hot Dog. What’s that, you ask? A bacon-wrapped hot dog served with grilled onions, jalapenos, pinto beans, mustard, and mayo. Yum!!! Raney, sadly did not get one, but she did make sure there were no stray crumbs left anywhere in her vicinity.

These two spent hours playing in the dog park. 

Proof that they CAN share the couch...for a few seconds anyway. Lol.

The Sonoran hotdogs were a hit!

The Big Social on Thursday evening, 3/23, was the last official Escapade event, but we weren’t done yet. Rog and I had signed up for the Guns and Ammo HOP on Friday. All sorts of fun activities are planned by the Head Out Program (HOP) and held throughout the year. This one was right up our alley. Even though Rog and I haven’t shot in over six years, we used to love competitive pistol shooting.  You could shoot revolver or semiauto, so of course we chose both. 😊 The Pima County Pistol Range was just down the road from the fairgrounds, so we had stopped by earlier in the week to test our guns and try to remember which end to point down range. Lol. Friday was clear, but cold and there were a bunch of no-shows so the revolver competition was just me against Rog. Who won? He did, of course. Did you even need to ask? 

Rog takes the prize for revolver class.

There were about 15 shooters in semiauto. I was shooting a .22 Ruger that I’d never shot before our brief practice session. We were all at the shooting line and the guy to my left was shooting a 9mm and his brass was ejecting and banging off my face and hat. During a 3-second timed course of fire one of his hot brass casings went down my shirt! Let me tell you I danced a jig but didn’t have time to fish it out. Lol. And you know what, even with all that - I won!!  Trust me when I say, no one was more surprised than I was! Bob and Carole had come to watch. (Thanks for taking pictures and not videoing my dance!)  Out of a possible 250 points, I squeaked into the lead with a score of 241, second place was 240, and Rog had 239. But a win is a win! Wooohooo! Both of us got certificates for a free week’s stay at any Escapee’s RV Park. I gave mine to Randy, who had so kindly given me the BIC certificate.

The semi-auto competition was heated!

To celebrate our success at the Guns and Ammo HOP, we went out to dinner at Guadalajara Original Grill. Bob and Carole remembered it fondly from their visit to Tucson last year and it was a fabulous recommendation. They made fresh salsa and guacamole table-side, what a treat. Excellent Mexican food and outstanding (and super-sized!) margaritas. Yum!

The margaritas were insane! 

Saturday, 3/25, was a free day and after all the non-stop activities you’d think we’d take a break. Nope. Carole and I drove into Tucson for the 4th St. Spring Street Fair. The city shuts down about six blocks and over 350 booths and about 50 food vendors line the streets. It was a huge event! Props to the city of Tucson for providing a shuttle service and cheap parking. It made it so easy. We finally had a warm sunny day with temps in the 80’s. Carole and I walked the entire length of the fair up and back. We enjoyed a very refreshing grape hard cider slushy on the way up and celebrated our new treasures with a tasting flight from the same Bawker Cider House after we’d completed the circuit. My favorite purchase was a very nice laser cut metal welcome sign with a mastiff. We didn’t see a mastiff on display, but the vendor kindly dug one out and I was thrilled! It’s so hard to find good mastiff stuff. Score!

Carole and I loved the street fair.

Meanwhile the guys opted to attend the Thunder and Lightning Over Arizona air show at the Davis-Monthan AFB. The show is held in Tucson every other year and draws huge crowds. There were performances by the U.S. Air Force Air Demonstration Squadron “Thunderbirds", A-10 Thunderbolt II Demonstration Team, F-35A Lightning II Demonstration Team, Wings of Blue Jump Team, Red Bull Fixed-Wing aircraft and skydivers, Smoke-n-Thunder Jet Shows, and many more. It was a beautiful clear day, perfect for the airshow.

The Thunderbirds.

Rog and Bob had a good time at the airshow.

The Thunderbirds were the main attraction,
but the stunt flyers and skydivers put on a great show!

We had one last task to do on Sunday, 3/26, before we pulled out of the fairgrounds. One of the perks of attending the Escapade was the opportunity to have our coach and toad weighed by the SmartWeigh team. Overweight rigs can be a safety hazard, often contributing to catastrophic tire failure. We’d had the rig on a truck scale before, but the advantage of the SmartWeigh system is that they weigh the rig on all four corners and can tell you not just if you’re overweight, but if your rig is out of balance. We went in with a full freshwater tank and empty holding tanks, with everyone seated in their usual positions. The Smart Weigh team was super efficient and after weighing both the rig and the toad, had us pull over so one of the team could go over the results. Overall, we were well under our allowed gross vehicle weight. We were a little out of balance, but Rog attributed that mostly to the fact that we only have slides on the driver’s side and that’s the side that was heavier (an extra 300 pounds on the front and 650 pounds on the rear). Bob and Carole had similar results with even more of an imbalance, but then they have a much larger driver’s side slide. With the information provided, Rog could look up the correct tire pressures for front and rear and make adjustments. Definitely something we’d like to do again.

The SmartWeigh team were super efficient.

The short bus is on the scales.
Will we need to go on a diet?

And speaking of again, next year’s Escapade will be held in Rock Springs, Wyoming in June. We are already thinking about how we can tack that onto a trip to Texas to see the total eclipse in April. That says a lot about how much we enjoyed our first Escapade!