Picked up our 2021 Escape 19 on Oct. 6

[Wendy.kin]

Thank you all for sharing your experiences and what you've learned and done with your Escape. Your posts have prepared us well for our first camping trip towing a trailer. It could not have gone any smoother. We are still learning backing up, but hopefully, that will come with more practice and trials.

In the following, we'd just like to share our 15-day trip towing our 19 home from Sumas for reference by those who will be picking up their trailer from Sumas in the future. We found @kavm's posts very helpful. Thanks, @kavm!

10/6 - picked up in Sumas and drove about 1.5 hour to Swinomish Casino & Lodge to camp for the next 5 nights. Thanks to @kavm for recommending this campground. It was indeed very nice - right in front of the water. We were also fortunate enough that we had Dave Warren from Escape deliver our trailer! He not only patiently showed us how to hitch and unhitch our trailer, but also pointed out some of the salient features of our trailer as well as helped us set the brake controller gain in our truck! Thanks again, Dave!

10/11 - 4-hour drive to Kitsap Memorial State Park for a one night stop on our way to Olympic NP. Did not have ferry reservations. Electric and water hookup only. Did not even unhitch. Had to stop for bathroom break and ended up in a Safeway parking lot in Gig Harbor. Was nervous at first towing our trailer into a busy parking lot but took it slow and managed to park it across two spaces away from the crowd.

10/12 - 3.5-hour drive to Quileute Oceanside Resort in La Push, WA for our next 3 nights to explore the Pacific Coast and Hoh Rainforest of Olympic NP. Our site is right in front of the beach. We highly recommend it. Note though that the grounds are unpaved and have a lot of potholes. So one has to be careful. Full hookup. Pull-through site. Did our first laundry here.

10/15 - 5-hour drive to Fort Stevens State Park in Oregon for 2-nights. Electric and water hookup only. Used free showers in the park. Our first experience dumping the tanks at the dump station on the way out. A very nice park with lots of things to do. Plan to visit again.

10/17 - 5-hour drive to Driftwood 2 Campground in Oregon Dunes. Was excited to see another Escape 19 with green decals going the other direction. No hookup. Pull-through site. Campground is more like a parking lot, but we kind of liked it, especially in the rain, it's not as messy. It's a campground for OHV enthusiasts but we still enjoyed our stay, walking on the beach. Used paid shower in the park.

10/19 - 4-hour drive to Crescent City DMV to register our trailer. Went without a hitch. There was practically no wait. Drove another hour or so to Elk Prairie Campground in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park for the next 2 nights. No hookup.

10/21 - Was going to Clear Lake State Park, CA for another night before driving back to the Bay Area but it rained the whole way and the forecast for Clearlake was rain all night as well. So we decide to bite the bullet and drive the extra two hours all the way to our storage. Dumped our tanks at the storage dump station.

We had driven through rain and wind, through winding, hilly roads, and urban areas. This trip has definitely boosted our confidence in towing a trailer. We have the new F150 hybrid and it has definitely made it a lot easier for someone new to towing like us. Also, so far, we have not had any major issue with our trailer, aside from some moisture on the floor of the cabinet below the refrigerator. Will debug this more on our next outing.

Sorry for the long post, but hopefully, somebody will find this helpful.

[YakRV]

Thank you, Wendy.kin, for adding to the collective Escape knowledge base - especially for those of us waiting for our own trailers. No need to apologize for the long post. Any other thoughts, anecdotes, words of new found wisdom are greatly appreciated.

[oldwave]

Nice to have a great truck like that, we picked ours up with a 13 year old f150 that towed our 21 like a dream . 4 years later it’s still towing great. Would love the truck you have .

[Bea]

What a wonderful 1st post! Great synopsis of your maiden voyage. We were hoping to stay at the Quileute Oceanside Resort in La Push this past April, when we were up in Washington but they were closed due to the pandemic. Glad they are open now and that you were able to stay there...must've been so nice. Thanks for sharing and a NorCal welcome aboard! -Bea

[Wendy.kin]

Thank you all for the encouragement.

My husband is really enjoying driving the F150. He's never really into driving, but takes to the F150 very differently. We've read so much about its towing prowess and when Ford came out with the hybrid, it was a no-brainer. But then again, since we've never driven another pickup or even SUV, we have nothing to compare it with. We also got the anti-sway fastway hitch by E2 that Escape sells, plus the supposedly anti-sway technology that comes with the F150, my husband would forget he is towing and I would need to remind him to slow down at the curves!

Yes, we really enjoyed Quileute Oceanside Resort, even though it was raining most of the time we were there, but we got enough reprieve in between the rain to go walk on the nearby beaches, as well as do a one-hour day-trip to the Hoh Rainforest.

A couple of things we'd like to add about the other campgrounds:

1. Fort Stevens has full hookup (for $2 more) and pull through sites that we did not know about when we booked ours.

2. At Elk Prairie, we booked site 5 which is one of the few sites out in the open next to the prairie. We will not be comfortable taking our trailer into the main loops of the campground. They seem too tight and a lot of low overhanging branches.

[Ron in BC]

Originally Posted by Bea

What a wonderful 1st post! Great synopsis of your maiden voyage.

Ditto

Ron