The ride to Block was a picture postcard, flat seas, beautiful skies, fast cruise all the way to the SW corner. We set up on the humps near the R4 buoy and dropped 2 live eels and a live pogie. On the first drift I showed the boys how it was done with a nice 20 LB bass that inhaled the pogie and put up a classic fight. The day was definitely looking up. Three more drifts in that general area (now with a lot of friends) yielded nothing so we moved further down the ledge. The 3 mile line was crowded with charters, and I didn't want to fish in a crowd, so we stopped about half way down the legal part of the ledge and started a drift that would take us SE off the ledge into about 75 feet of water. By this time the bluefish and doggies had reduced our bait supply to 1 remaining eel and some pogie chunks. I gave Jim, the rookie, the last eel as Matt (the business associate) had reeled in a fluke, a dogfish and had had several good hits go missing. Jim had never seriously fished for striped bass before, strictly panfish and trout ponds. I checked his leader and found some scratches so I cut off a few inches and retied the hook. I put the last eel on Jim's hook and Matt and I dropped the chunks. About halfway to the drop-off Jim's reel starting singing that wonderful song and I flipped the drag lever forward. I was surprised when the song actually picked up and the lightweight rod doubled over against the drag. This was something different for sure.
Jim almost fell down twice during the fight. He was 26 years old and in good shape but was exhausted when it was over, as I had to keep telling him to breathe! When the fish came to the boat I could see the circle hook in the upper lip and the knot in the water like I had "super vision", all I could think was "knot, please hold!" I had gotten a new net for Christmas this year, Karen bought the biggest one in the store, partly to give me a hard time as she always catches the bigger fish and I have to net them. As I slipped the net over the exhausted cow's tail I realized I had another problem, the net did not even come to the mid point of the fish's body. I was not going to be able to get the center of gravity into the net! I handed the net to Matt, and because I now wear heavy, no-slip gloves when on the water, I slipped my hands into the gill plate and mouth and yelled for Matt to lift the tail with the net and we heaved the fish over the gunnel. A quick weigh at the scene showed well over 50lbs, and we celebrated like school boys. Back to New Harbor and Champlain's for some ice and a celebratory Mudslide and we had quite a crowd gather at the dock to see the fish. A careful weight without boat motion showed the spring scale bottomed out at it's maximum, 55 pounds. Back in Wickford we idled through the Harbor showing the fish to cheers and applause from the town dock (It was Art Festival weekend and the place was packed). People drove children up to us in dingies asking to see it again. We attended a friends' birthday party on the dock at Wickford Shipyard that night and the fish was the talk of the town. "Did you hear a guy caught a 55 pound bass today? Oh yeah, that's Ric, over there....." Truly a day I will always remember!
All in all, just a fantastic experience. I told Jim that he should never go bass fishing again, it was over for him. Just this one trip, the best he would probably ever have, should be enough.
