Premises Park Indoor Park BMX/Skate Shop — Attraction in Tucson

I sat down the other day and figured i'm close to approaching my mid-life crisis age. Back in the day that meant buying a sportscar, a boat or a house but since my generation is the redheaded stepchild of prosperity, I don't think ill be affording any of those things anytime soon. But you know what I CAN afford? A skateboard. You know what else I can afford? A no-skip CD player with a copy of the Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 soundtrack.

I fired up my Yahoo search engine and saw that there were a couple of local outdoor skateparks nearby but seeing as how i'm not a fan of heat stroke, I found an indoor option with Premises Park Indoor BMW/Skate Park on 1th Street. I pulled out my old wardrobe box and found some JNCOs, a button-up dragon shirt and some oakleys. Also my friend, Beef, let me borrow a pair of his Vans. Heck yeah! I grabbed a can of Surge to pound on the way and headed out. I figured I look decently young for my age but the Oakleys and devil-may-care attitude would probably shave another 10 years off. Also I hear skate-parks have prison rules. You gotta find the coolest kid and go start a fight with him. But I didn't want to have my family and friends see me get arrested for punching a teenager at a skate park. They wouldn't be surprised but that's not the point. There had to be another way to establish dominance.

I pulled the skateboard out of my truck, loaded up the CD player and skipped ahead to "Bring Tha Noize" by Anthrax ft. Chuck D. of Public Enemy but not before giving someone 5 bucks to open the front door for me to skate through. All about making an entrance. So I just got some good momentum going and flew right threw the entrance. I whooshed right by the front counter and i'm sure the staff was as shocked as they were impressed as I zoomed right into the main park area. Tons of little rapscallions being rad and carefree doing 'tricks' on their bmx bikes, skateboards and scooters. A good amount of them looked up to see a blur of badassery go right by them. I was in the zone and everyone was waiting for me to pull off an anti casper flip, a 360 varial Mctwist, a hardflip bs nose picker or a Tucson Tornado. But just as I got to the edge of the deck, my heart skipped a gnarly beat as I realized I don't even know how to skate. I've never skated in my life. If I dipped into the bowl, I was never coming out alive. So I quickly just threw myself to the ground and realized I was out of breath. The skateboard shot off to my left and some young punk stopped it with his foot. I took off my over ear Sony headphones and looked up to see a staff member jogging towards me "dude, you gotta pay!" Turns out it was $7 bucks for the hour. I reached in my pockets and had to sift through the pogs and tootsie pops to find some crumpled dollar bills and quarters. I had $6.23 but I think he felt bad and just told me I just had to sign a no helmet waiver.

Some kids were laughing and some older teens were taking photos but I had nothing to lose anymore. Kevin, the front desk guy asked me if I wanted skate lessons and I just told him "I'll pass because nothing is better than a life lesson, Kevin". I ended up renting a scooter and hung with the weird scooter kids for an hour because they know more about being an outcast than the skate and bmx kids but I decided to leave when I banged my shin trying to do a spin trick. Also it turns out the no-skip cd player was a lie. It kept skipping on Evil Eye by Fu Manchu when I was hobbling out of there. Either way, I guess I better start watching some Youtube tutorials before showing my face in there again. Great staff and sick set up,...

I’m a beginner blader and just had a very bad experience. I went to the upstairs street course and tried to rotate in to get familiar with the obstacles. I was trying to step up grind a small box and it seemed everyone was skating this side. So I went to the the opposite corner with the concrete curbs where no one had been. As I try to rub my grind plate on the curb to get a feel, one of the skateboarders comes right at me, apparently he feels compelled to skate diagonally at me. He’s an adult btw, not a kid. I apologize to him for getting in his way, assuming it’s my fault as I’m new. The guy doesn’t even acknowledge me, nor did anyone else when I was in there. I definitely did not feel welcome here whatsoever. I left after 10 minutes and I consider it a $7 lesson. I told the guy at the front desk I felt like I was in the way and he didn’t seem to care about how beginners are treated. All the skaters at the outdoor parks have been great. I don’t know what’s up with these guys, it’s like the 90s again, us bladers are...

great place for all ages, they even have beginner lessons available during summer hours, friendly staff, and the locals are super nice & supportive towards new faces, pro vert section is great, endless lines and bug transfers, street section is the best one yet, yall just need a new flat rail. love the pedal room, very spread-out layout. A/C in lobby/store area, swamp coolers and multiple fans set up in key spots throughout the park,...