Outdoor Storytellers – Ladies Night
LEWISTON — As with any marriage there are things you like to do together, and apart. But for one Lewiston couple, what they like to do together doesn’t exactly happen every day.
It’s just before midnight on the Clearwater River in Lewiston. The rods and reels are already put out on the troll. We don’t have any fish in the boat, but Corin Richert is just happy to be on the river with her husband, Doug.
“I’ve been asking him to take me night fishing for two years,” she says, “and this is my first time out.”
Now, it’s not as if Doug doesn’t want to take Corin fishing at least once a year. It’s that he’s a fishing guide, full-time, all year long. If he had the time, then the family would be broke.
“It’s not frustrating, because I know that’s what his job is,” Corin says. “But a lot of times it’s like, ‘I wanna go,’ ’cause I never fished before I met him. I mean, little trout and that, but beyond that. And then all of a sudden, he brought it in and I’m like, whoa, that’s fun! So now, I’m like, ‘I wanna go out. Can I go?'”
So, on hot August nights like these on the Clearwater River, when the catch and release season for steelhead is open, Doug and Corin get to fish together.
“I just wanted the wife to come out and catch a few fish before the season started up hot and heavy and I was gone all the time,” Doug says.
And on this night, Corin caught more than a few. It started, of course, with the first steelhead. Then came the second, then the third, and then the fourth By 1:30 a.m., she’d caught eight. Doug’s obviously a good guide, and tonight he was testing new lures.
By 3 a.m., we’d caught and released 14 steelhead, making it a great night. But Corin never forgets the first steelhead she caught with Doug years ago, and she reminds him about it all the time.
“Actually, the first steelhead I ever caught, the leader snapped because it was poorly tied and he still has not heard the end of that one,” Corin says, laughing. “So if he blew a net job, he’d really be in trouble.”
