One of three

All three photos posted this morning were taken yesterday, 25 May 2015, when my daughter and I spent the day driving a large area NW of Calgary - a round trip of 340 km. The perfect way to celebrate my birthday : ) Most of the roads were roads that I had driven before, but my daughter had never been to most of the area. I had never driven to Big Hill Springs Provincial Park, but had been several times on birding trips with friends.

I had really, really hoped to find a Great Gray Owl, as my daughter has never seen one in the wild. No luck yesterday, even though I knew a few areas to check. In fact, we saw so few birds of any kind! I'm always thankful that we both enjoy taking photos of all sorts of things, including barns. The old barn in this photo was one of three at this particular location. Though you can't really tell from my photo - difficult to get a good angle from the road, especially as the barns are side by side - these barns are very long, with a good number of cupolas on the roof.

Just over two years ago, a friend had asked if I wanted to "go on a drive" and we came across this ranch and stopped briefly so that I could take a couple of shots. That day must have been the worst day of that winter, lol! Blowing snow that made it so difficult to tell ground from sky and road from ditches. A white barn on white ground against a white sky had been a challenge! Ever since then, I had vowed that one day, I would be brave enough to drive myself and revisit in better weather. Knowing how much my daughter loves old barns was a huge motivation to make the drive, too. I was almost tempted to go up to the farm house yesterday and ask if it would be OK if we photographed these barns (from the road), but I chickened out. Regretted it later when I got home and confirmed that this ranch was owned by the same owners as another location just outside the city, that I had been lucky enough to visit on a botanizing trip in 2009 - wonderful old barns at that location, too.

Our little adventure started off in hopes of seeing a Red Fox family (out of luck), then driving the Grand Valley Rd and area. We stopped at Wynchell Lake, where my daughter spotted a Great Blue Heron and a very distant Kingfisher perched on a piece of driftwood. Also some kind of shorebird. She has great eyes for spotting things!

From there, we travelled eastwards and eventually reached Big Hill Springs Provincial Park. I had been hoping that there might at least be some wildflowers in bloom, but Dandelions were all we saw all day! Plenty of green foliage everywhere, but no flowers. Since yesterday, Alberta is under a province-wide fire ban thanks to the lack of rain. Everywhere is bone dry, which I would imagine is affecting the growth of plants. After I had dropped my daughter off at home, I did get some rain on my drive home - there were even snowflakes mixed in with the rain.

Another thing I saw on my drive home, while stopped at a traffic light, were four Jack Rabbits that had fun chasing each other round the base of a huge Spruce tree near the edge of the road and then they all ran across the road in single file between my car and the car in front. They were so, so cute : )