T H E      O R E G O N     C O A S T

I never get nervous photographing in dark places at night. Maybe I'm used to it - and maybe that's bad.  The biggest scare I ever had was on the Oregon Coast.  After your eyes adjust, you can see quite a bit.  It's fairly bright.  However, it's dangerous.  Cliff lead to edges that lead straight down to the water. Anyone in their right mind walking on a trail in this area should have a small flash light showing the way.  After shooting a bit, my friend Kathy was out on a rock about 500 yards in front of me. It must have been around midnight or later. She kept shining her light toward me and I wasn't sure why.  Finally, I hear her yelling, but the sound of the ocean beating on the rocks below drowned out her words.  She started walking back over to me.  I had stopped shooting, since her light was in my frame. "Did you see that guy?" she said. What guy?  There was nothing, nobody, pure darkness. "He was right in front of you, looking at his phone. I turned around and then his light was off. He disappeared."  There was, in fact, a trail just in front of me that was lower on the hill - just low enough with high brush that if anyone were standing on it, I would probably not see them.  Once we realized something was not quite right, someone was in the area without a light on and just disappeared or was hidden, we packed up and booked it up that hill as fast as we could. We didn't bother putting away much - I remember carrying equipment and a flashlight in one hand - just running up that hill looking back like the scenes from Blair Witch Project.  It was freaky. The first two pictures in this series was from that night.