Thursday, March 19, 2015

THOUGHTS FROM ESCAPADE

Currently in Goodyear AZ (Low 55 Rain and Clouds High 80) 

We spent last week in Tucson at the 55th Escapade; a combination of fellowship with other members of the Escapees RV Club (aka SKPs), fun and education. A few observations:

Never underestimate the power of the Escapade curse. Long time readers will recall that this is probably the 3rd or 4th Escapade we have tried to attend. The M and M issues seemed to rear their heads, medical and mechanical, preventing our attendance. We got to the Escapade and parked and got setup.




We went to the opening ceremony and the evening entertainment, then the curse reared its ugly head. Jo got sick and was sick the rest of the time in Tucson and a couple of days after we got back to Goodyear. We saw the doctor immediately after we got back and he thought it was a stomach flu. Took about a week but it ran its course. We have learned to never underestimate the power of the Escapade curse :-(

Bob was able to attend most of the seminars and walked around the vendor floor although he did get dehydrated one day and had to take it easy, that dang ole curse again. He did experience a little satellite envy while walking around the roughly 850 rigs in attendance.



We just have the smaller one, we can honestly say we have not seen a dish that big on top of an RV before.

It was great to hear Kay Peterson (co-founder of the Escapees RV Club) in person but it was an absolute honor when Bob was able to meet her, even if only very briefly. As you can imagine she was swarmed wherever she went.

This was our first big rally after attending the Oregon Cascaders smaller rally last year. There was more to do at the big rally and lots of seminars to choose from but it seemed like Bob was always heading somewhere to the next thing. The smaller rally was more intimate and less hectic and will probably be our choice for the near future, considering the curse of course.

March Madness begins today so Bob will be a hermit for the next 4 days watching basketball games all day long. 16 games will be on TV today on 4 networks.




There will be 16 tomorrow and 8 games each on Saturday and Sunday. His brackets are filled out and he is ready for the best sporting event ever. His Iowa State Cyclones are in the tourney again and are the 2nd game this morning.

Till next time,

Bob and Jo

Monday, March 9, 2015

ON THE ROAD AGAIN - TO TUCSON ARIZONA

Currently in Tucson AZ (Low 48 Plenty of Sun High 78)

We left Goodyear yesterday and headed to Escapade in Tucson.


It was approximately 155 miles, here is the route we took.




Here we are parked in our 50a FHU site at the Pima County Fairgrounds, one of only four 50a sites available.



Here is to the left showing all the RVs and the mountains in the distance.




We attended the opening ceremony and the best thing was the talk by Kay Peterson, cofounder of the Escapees RV Club who gave a wonderfully funny talk. We had great entertainment last night, "The Rivoli Revue", if you ever get the chance to see them we highly recommend them. Best known for the youtube sensation of "Press 1 for English" they also spent a year in Branson and was named best new show and best female singer. But the open road beckoned and they hit the road again in their RV.

Today began with a full schedule of seminars and seeing the latest from the vendors. We also plan on stopping in and talking to the service department at La Mesa while here this week. Our plan is to be back in Goodyear on Friday. 

Till next time,

Bob and Jo

Sunday, March 8, 2015

WHERE DID THE WINTER GO?

Currently in Goodyear AZ (Low 42 Currently Mostly Sunny 46)
Heading to Tucson AZ (Currently 49 Partly Sunny High 77) 

Where did the winter go? Or at least our winter, the Valley of the Sun winter :-)

This winter has been the winter of the new home. We put our life on hold for most of the winter either waiting for the delivery or getting the place organized. There were people we wanted to meet up with that we have not and things we thought we might do this winter. All for this



We did see a few movies and "American Sniper" was one of them.



We both thought it was an incredible movie and should have won more awards than it did. Bradley Cooper was amazing. When all the controversy erupted we decided not to blog about it at that time because we were afraid we would not be very civil to the idiots that were badmouthing the movie.

We are off to Tucson today for the Escapees Escapade, the annual gathering of the Escapees RV Club with seminars and vendors, entertainment and food.



We will be back in Goodyear on Friday and will be there until at least the end of March (more on that later).

Till next time,

Bob and Jo

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

SANDRA - "THE GREAT ORGANIZER"

Currently in Goodyear AZ (Low 42 Partly Cloudy High 63) 

We blogged earlier about Sandra, aka "The Cutest Cat Ever"



who now has a new nickname, "The Great Organizer". She has to be involved in everything that goes on in her home. You can imagine she has been real busy while her staff has been getting organized. She was in rare form while we were working on the storage behind our 50" television. The amount of storage there is amazing. 



Here is the TV pulled out on its mounting bracket to get at the storage area. JJ is also there to make sure we do it right.



Notice the blue tape around the round holes. 



We put it there so Sandra wouldn't go thru it. Long time readers will recall that she wedged her way into the much smaller hole cutout for the LP detector when Bob was replacing it. We had to help her get out. Well the blue tape did not work.



At least this time she was able to get herself back out.



We finally have most of the stuff in the Lifestyle organized thanks to Sandra and JJ. You don't see them here but they made sure Bob hung the hanger for the Dyson Animal vacuum cleaner and the fire extinguisher in the closet correctly.



A lot of the storage is the same as our Cameo so that helped. We did use this time to get rid of some stuff that we haven't used in 5 years. We hope to finish in a couple of days and then start having some fun again.

Till next time,

Bob and Jo