Can't believe my amazing luck today

Late this afternoon after a day of shopping and putting it all away, I decided I'd take a walk down to the owl's tree and see if I could get a better photo of the owl. Turns out yesterday's owl was the dad. The mom is sitting on the eggs. And the other owl Ian saw is part of another pair that live in a different part of the park.

I walked down by myself. Arvin decided to stay in. I went to the tree but there were no owls out at all. I looked really carefully in the trees all around the nest tree. No go. So I wandered on along the path. As I was nearing the junction with the main path I heard bird sounds behind me and turned to check them out. This is what I saw! I was totally amazed and felt so lucky. There he was, not more than 20 feet from where I was standing. When I first saw him he was behind facing me. I took some photos while small birds continued to hassle him from the other side. Amazingly there was a humming bird that kept bobbing around near him and several other small birds. Finally he turned to face them and pointed his beautiful back in my direction. I had to make a bit of noise, scuffing my foot on the path, to get him to turn back to look at me. And here is the best shot of that magnificent bird. As they say in the British Isles, "I'm totally chuffed!" Do take a look in large.

More photos of the park and the owl at Chaikins of Bellingham.