Welcome Doug & Roma.
I hope you like you’ll like your 5.0 as much we do.
Lots of great thoughts and comments on the Forum for all your optional items.
A few thoughts.
Awning: if I bought a new 5.0 I’d still get a manual awning for the reasons others have given, but I’d add two more. We’ve been really shocked at some of the incredible wind gusts we’ve had both here on Vancouver Island as well in the Las Vegas area last May. Some of them were so strong I was worried about the integrity of the mounts & we put the awning away immediately, (even though we had four deflappers on). I’m not sure how the electric model would’ve fared well in those situations (or closed fast enough), being secured only longitudinally. The other reason is a little bonus…..our manual awning is longer than the elect. model….for some reason.
Oven: we have the 3 burner cook top & oven. While we too cook mostly outside during the summer, we love our oven for shoulder season camping and for baking & heating stuff up. Really nice to have when you arrive late to camp sometimes or in the pouring rain. Would order again.
Microwave: love our microwave for heating things up, especially my coffee when I get distracted, which seems to be happening more often these days.
Thermostat: those original Dometic controls are not good as others have mentioned. If you can have them install a simple digital one, or do it yourself, it’s dead easy to replace.
Optional outside access: I don’t have the optional outside cubby door by the batteries in the rear - wish I did.
Dinette: A lot of people rave about the U-shaped dinette. We have the two straight benches instead and love it, (if we had young kids with us still, or grandkids this might be different). More space for your legs down below and a m u c h bigger table. Once we’re set up we can keep a lot of things on the table under the window (condiments, binoculars, books, laptop etc and still have tons of space to eat dinner without moving it all. I’m not saying that the straight bench is better, but rather, as Centex said, try to see some of these things personally if you can, to make a better decision for your lifestyle.
Optional cubbies beside your head when sleeping. We didn’t get those and have never missed having them. We have several small baskets along the side of the bed for eyeglasses, books, flashlight.
Safety: Not an option from Escape but a cheap, easy mod we’re very happy with: I was worried about about my wife tripping down the stairs to the bathroom in the night. I installed a small battery powered motion night light on the stairs, below the bed. It’s been fantastic, as it comes on just as soon as your foot comes over the end of the bed & goes out fairly quickly afterwards.
Towing: We started off with a heavy traditional hitch in the truck bed. I was over on the mainland with my truck & on a whim stopped in to discuss the Andersen Hitch. They talked me in to it & installed it while I waited. I haven’t looked back. I love it and find it much easier (faster) to hook up. I recommend.
Best of luck!
