First Trip To Bass Pro Shops

No, not my first trip to Bass Pro Shops, but my daughter's. When she got home from school on Friday, I told her we were going to Bass Pro over the weekend.

Daughter: "What's that?"

Me: "Bass Pro Shops. It's a big store with lots of fishing and hunting stuff."

I walked over to the coffee table and picked up the 2011 Bass Pro Fishing Master catalog - the Holy Grail of fishing catalogs. Her eyes got really big when I handed it to her. She started flipping through it and picking out things she liked. Keep in mind my daughter is six.

Daughter: "Do they have all this stuff in the store?"

Me: "Yup."

Daughter: "How does it all fit?"

Me: "It's a big store."

She then proceeded to cut bookmarks out of construction paper so she could mark the pages of things she wanted. She needed a lot of bookmarks.

The big day came and we met my good friend, Jim, who was playing chauffeur for the trip - mainly because he gets mildly carsick if he isn't driving. My daughter brought along the Bass Pro catalog complete with bookmarks.

We arrived at Bass Pro and, of course, the biggest decision was where to start. I had it in my mind that I would get the few things I needed and then we could spend time just looking around. I had a reel with me I was trading in that would knock X amount of money off a new reel so I took care of that first.

The ground floor was primarily fishing and boating and was quite crowded. It was the first weekend of Bass Pro's big Spring Fishing Classic Show and lots of people were gearing up for fishing. The aquarium was also on the first floor so after I got the reel I wanted, my daughter and I went to look at the fish. She enjoyed seeing the big bass, catfish, bluegills, and other fish swimming around the huge tank. There were a lot of animal mounts around the store and she pointed them all out as we walked by. The center of the ground floor had a "stream" running through it with live fish and turtles. She got a kick out of the turtles with their heads poking up out of the water. 

We eventually made our way over to the boats. Each boat had a placard next to it with all the specs and prices. My daughter was looking at one boat and motioned for me to come over. 

Daughter: "Daddy, we could get this boat. It's only for three and twenty-four dollars." 

Me: "Sweetie, that's thirty-two thousand four hundred dollars." 

Daughter: "Whaaat? Oh, my gosh!" 

Welcome to what us adults call the real world. 

We finished our tour of the ground floor and went up to the second floor which was hunting, camping, and clothing. The clothing section was closest so we headed there first so I could look for a particular shirt. 

Daughter: "Ugh. I don't wanna look at men's stuff. BOR-ING!" 

Me: laughing

I found the shirt and then we wandered through the hunting section. She looked at the knives and walked along the gun wall. From there she wanted to go look at the kayaks. She wanted to buy one, but couldn't understand why only one person could fit in it. Then she went over to the tent displays and went inside to inspect each one.

After we finished on the second floor, we went back downstairs so we could find her a new rod and reel. We're well past the days of Snoopy rods. After thirty minutes of looking at various rod and reel combo's, we finally decided on a Zebco outfit and got her fixed up with some tackle. She also picked out a nice red Bass Pro koozie. I found a rod to go with my reel and by that time Jim was done with his shopping. Plus, my daughter informed me she was starving. She tends to overuse the word as kids do, but I was hungry, too, so we decided it was time to check out.

Speaking of the check out, it was the only hitch in an otherwise fun afternoon. The young kid at the register was very slow at the whole process and had the personality of concrete. He clearly did not want to be there, but we finally got-er-done.

I spent the ride home listening to Jim and my daughter banter back and forth. Jim has three kids of his own - two of them girls. He and my daughter got into an in-depth conversation about SpongeBob Squarepants and his undersea friends. That led to the Penguins of Madagascar which somehow led to Hong Kong Phooey....

I closed my eyes. Any time spent with my daughter is time well spent.