The day of the fishing trip, Chief refuses to sweep the floor for the African-American aides. McMurphy enlists Rub-a-Dub George, a cleanliness-obsessed Swedish sailor and fisherman, in the crew. When Candy Starr appears without her friend to pick up the patients for their excursion, Nurse Ratched announces that they can’t go because there isn’t enough room in one vehicle for all the patients. McMurphy talks Doctor Spivey into driving his own car. Spivey consents, partially because of his physical attraction to the alluringly attired Starr.
The group stops at a gasoline station on their way to the docks where they are treated rudely by the station attendants. McMurphy intervenes and the group is invigorated, a feeling that quickly evaporates when they reach the docks. Fishermen at the docks make negative comments about the patients and lewd remarks to Starr. The group, separated from McMurphy, make no effort to defend themselves or Starr from the rude behavior. The boat captain refuses to rent the boat to McMurphy because proper legal waivers weren’t filled out. Frustrated, McMurphy gives the captain a bogus phone number and, while the captain makes a phone call, loads the boat and heads out to sea with the group.
McMurphy takes Starr below deck for a sexual interlude, and the group takes turns fishing. Before long, they are upon a school of fish and are bringing in salmon. The pandemonium that ensues resolves itself in the group engaged in the regenerative act of unabashed laughter. Spivey lands a huge flounder, which takes him more than an hour to bring on board. This causes the group to experience rough waters on their way back to dock. When they notice that there aren’t enough lifejackets for the entire group, Chief notices that McMurphy wears one anyway.
When they return, their prodigious catch earns them the respect of the fisherman at the dock. The change in the patients is apparent to everyone: “these weren’t the same bunch of weak-knees from a nuthouse that they’d watched take their insults on the dock this morning.”
Driving back to the hospital, McMurphy convinces the group to drive by one of his boyhood homes. Chief notices that McMurphy is acting tired beyond the exertions of the day’s excursion while McMurphy relates a lurid tale of losing his virginity when he was ten years old to a girl the same age or younger. While he relates further stories of barroom fights and sexual conquests, Chief recognizes a frantic look on McMurphy’s face, “like there wasn’t time left for something he had to do…”
