The Picture-Perfect Stroll on Plum Island

It’s toward the end of her walk that Libby Delana finds her picture. For the past hour she’s made her way along the paths of the Parker River National Refuge on Plum Island, Massachusetts, a barrier island off the state’s North Shore that is home to thousands of federally protected seaside acres. Through towering beach grass that hangs heavy with dew, through a scrubby dune-scape, through a forest that will soon glow red with September foliage, Delana meanders along the boardwalk. Stopping, gazing, contemplating. Look at that spiderweb. Listen to that ocean. Is that a blue heron?

It’s fresh appreciation for familiar ground. For the past five years or so, Delana, an art director and cofounder of a marketing agency in her hometown of nearby Newburyport, has made walking this land an early morning habit. “It’s a way of slowing down,” she says. “It’s probably my most creative time of day.”

This ritual is accompanied by an artistic endeavor. For each session, Delana uses her iPhone to take a single image of the landscape. She then shares her discovery on Instagram with her 5,500-plus followers. Often the picture is accompanied by a quote from a favorite author or sometimes a pithy line from the photographer herself. “Same walk, different day. Always,” she recently wrote.

This morning’s search concludes on the edge of a service road that runs by the sea. It’s there, amid the rusting marsh vegetation, a family of white herons patrolling the waters, and a silky fog that hides a gently curling Atlantic, that Delana takes out her phone and frames her shot.

“Just look at that,” she says in a whisper. She taps her screen, then fixes her gaze on the scene for several long seconds. “It’s like a painting.”

Soon, the herons take notice of Delana’s presence. A few flutter into flight and glide toward a more remote patch of water. She watches the big birds land, then scans the landscape one last time.

“Our days are filled with emails and other messages,” Delana says, still whispering. “Bing, bing, bing. To have a chance to be in a place like this, that’s good. That’s good for all parts of us.”

With that, she wheels around and begins to walk back to her car, to head home and move into the rest of her day.