Spotted an owl-Snowy Actually!

Yet another first in my life of outdoor adventure. Despite living the majority of my life in northern latitudes including very close to the province of Quebec which boasts as its provincial bird the snowy owl-I had never seen one of these majestic birds. Yesterday my snowy owl drought ended. On a long bike ride that took me to Fir Island (where I saw 1,000s of snow geese) and along the Skagit River (where I saw 100s of trumpeter and tundra swans) and then finally to Edison on Samish Bay-all alone on the side of the road surveying a field was a young snowy owl! It just stared as all five in my bike group pedal by. Gorgeous bird. At first I thought it was a hawk and was perplexed by all of its white. Then I realized with its rounded head and flat face it was a young snowy owl as it was still sporting lots of gray bands. Of course I didn't have a camera on me to capture it. But boy this was a much better experience than last April's owl experience at Alice Lake Provincial Park in British Columbia where a barred owl swooped down at me and chased me down a trail for a good quarter mile. I'll take the roadside snowy owl any day over the in flight Barred owl coming at me. And who would have thought that my snowy sighing would have been by way of spoke and sprocket?

(photo of adult male snowy owl courtesy of Wikipedia)