Boomerville – Getting Acquainted in the Desert

For those who are totally confused when I talk about Boomerville, let me explain.  We belong to a large RV group called Escapees.  Being so large, this group has what they call BOF (‘birds of a feather’) sub-groups.  There are lots and lots of these groups and we have held back until recently in joining, considering we aren’t really ready for a lot of organization our focus in this lifestyle yet.  The Boomers BOF, however, is a very loosely organized group of RVers, who have been born between the age of 1946 and 1964 (yes, that’s where the name Boomers comes from).  Boomerville here at Quartzsite tends to be their largest gathering and then after that they have various ‘Boomerangs’ where members can get together and socialize in various parts of the country.  They also usually do a few things together at the Escapees annual rally, called Escapade.

Boomers also do something I think is awesome which is do things at their get-togethers to make a little money, such as someone doing a pancake breakfast or someone making something neat to raffle, also some informal auctions, and donate the proceeds to the Escapees CARE program.  This program provides a place in Livingston, TX, for full-time RVers who due to age or health must come off-the-road.  The Boomer group last year donated $6000 to this cause.  One of the raffles this year is for a neat wooden board set for playing ‘Pegs and Jokers’.  Ken and I have not learned this game yet but hopefully will get time to learn while with this group. 

We currently have approximately 50 RV’s spread out across this part of the desert that have registered at the tent as part of the Boomer group.  Everyday everyone gathers at the 4pm social hour.  This is the view of the social hour from our front window so the site we chose definitely helps us stay in the loop.

It’s nice that although no one is officially coordinating, there are folks who take on making announcements about what is going on and answer group questions at the beginning of this time.

On Tuesday morning there were organized walks and at 10 a.m. a Women’s Council where we broke up in to small groups of about six so we women could get to know one another better going through a series of RVing related questions.  This was an excellent introduction to the group.

Since Ken and I had not been in to Quartzite yet.  We decided to take the advice of other jeep-people and take a back way in to town, off the paved roads.  In the photo below you can see the town as we near Quartzsite.

 

 

Definitely a more scenic route in to town, and, yet again, a reminder to us of why we are so happy with our choice of a jeep as our toad (towed vehicle).

 

We picked up a few things at the Quartzsite Dollar Store and a couple of food items for future potlucks at the General Store.  Believe me, they were right that you don’t want to have to grocery shop in Quartzsite.  The prices are outrageous here.

As we continue to deliberate on whether we will sell the house and go full-time, we also research what kind of rig we would like long-term for such a lifestyle.  Part of our plan for this trip was to look at rigs more suitable to full-timing.  Although we could make it work in this rig, Ken is hesitant to spend more money on our current rig unless he’s sure its what we want for the longterm.  Ken has had his eye on the 36 foot Tiffin motorhomes for some time while I was not convinced I wanted to start living in a vehicle that was smaller than what we have today (39 feet).   In Quartzsite, I finally got to spend time inside an 36 foot Allegro Bus and yes, I LOVE IT.  It is actually larger than what we have today when you considering it has 4 slides and pass-thru storage in the basement.   I must say though that they had a Itasca Eclipse 42U that certainly looked good to me, but adding length is not something Ken is interested in looking at right now.   Having experience now, and if we finalize a full-time decision, we’d love to find the 36 foot Bus a year or two old.  While we were very lucky on our current rig when brand new, we continue to hear a lot of horror stories of all the fixes needed on rigs the first year on the road.  There’s also a significant drop in the price as soon as it goes from new to used. But, the nice things is, we are in no hurry.  We have found that we create the best versions of ourselves  by taking the time to enjoy together researching what’s next, talking to others about all the ‘w’s (what, when, where, why….)  that are part of creating this lifestyle  and enjoying that planning part of the journey as much as the execution.

After having fun rig shopping we dropped in to a local Mexican restaurant for a very late lunch and then headed back to Boomerville in time for happy hour.  A full moon was already rising.  As you can see, Ken put up our EIU flag on the rig since it is easy to lose your way back home in this environment and it can act as a sort of beacon!

 

Since we’d had a large, late Mexican lunch, we grilled sandwiches and had soup for supper.  Then we headed back over to the circle for the evening campfire.

As usual, there was yet another priceless sunset to end the day.

Hugs, C