Walking down the road/path between Sunnybrook hospital and the side-entry of Sunnybrook park, I was thinking about how quiet the ravine was. ie, very few birds to be heard. Heard a rustle - and looked to my right to see a pileated woodpecker, pretty much at eye-level and ~30' away, contentedly excavating a massive tree. There was a small spot of sun that had made its way through the forest, that just managed to illuminate him/her perfectly for a while.
Probably my closest encounter with one yet, MASSIVE bird (maybe it was just the proximity - but it did seem larger than others I've seen), and suddenly my somewhat bad day was just marvelous.
