It was months in the works, but finally we were hooking up with our guide, Landon Mayer, in Divide, CO to make our way to the Dream Stream section of the South Platte river to get our trip off to a great start. You’ll probably recognize Landon from pretty much every fly fishing publication out there, he has numerous books and videos, as well as his guide business. Our three week Colorado trip was to take in some of the most famous rivers in Colorado, the South Platte, the Conejos, the Animas, and the San Juan in New Mexico. This would be my first major multi-river fly fishing trip, and the first for my girlfriend and new fly fisher, Megan. My plan was to start the trip off with a bang on the South Platte, and boy did it work out!After following Landon to the South Platte we rigged up and made our way over to the river. The Dream Stream section of the So. Platte sits in a beautiful meadow and is full of huge browns and rainbows that have made their way up from Spinney Reservoir. Landon spent some time educating us on how we needed to stalk the fish and pretty much do exactly what he says.Within ten minutes Landon had me on my first fish of the day which was by far the largest brown trout I’d ever caught, I told this to Landon and he simply said, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.” Landon then spotted a large brown sitting along the far bank (I couldn’t see anything!!) he set me up and within minutes I was hooked up and sprinting down stream trying to keep up with my fish. After getting my line and breath back Landon netted a beautiful brown trout for me. I was so excited but now I needed Megan to get some fish.Landon set Megan up on a bend in the river that was holding a huge rainbow that was feeding on the surface. Having already caught two fish, I sat down to watch the action. Megan and Landon worked the rainbow for the better part of an hour, she missed two strikes on dries, and then as soon as they swapped back to a nymph rig, Megan was hooked up. Megan and Landon sprinted after the fish down river and eventually netted the fish of the day, a beautiful rainbow.The rest of the day was full of fish stalking, hook ups, down river sprinting, and break offs. Landon was an excellent guide and teacher, I always ask LOTS of questions to the guides I’ve fished with, so I was constantly peppering Landon with nonstop questions. We wrapped the day up with a lesson on spotting fish, and this lesson would serve me well for the rest of the trip, which though the So. Platte was amazing, would only get better. Stay tuned for Part 2: The Conejos