After running in darkness, he sees light.

Byline: George Schroeder The Register-Guard

SOMEWHERE NEAR MIST - New batteries for the flashlight would have been a good idea.

As I ran up a hill on an overcast night in the middle of nowhere, a little more illumination would have been helpful. Not that I'd have known where I was going. But at least I'd have seen how to get there.

Instead, the weak yellow beam served mostly to reveal the choking dust stirred up by passing vans. But I was grateful for the vans' occasional presence. When they approached, then rolled on by, their headlights provided a few seconds of vision.

Then they were gone, leaving me in near total darkness, which amplified the crunch-crunch-crunch of gravel beneath my feet.

This was the Hood to Coast relay, early last Saturday, a couple of hours after midnight. And at this point I was wondering, just how did I get to this point? And where exactly was this point?

And right about then, it seemed like someone had sent the new guy on a snipe hunt.

Last Wednesday, when I'd been in Oregon roughly five minutes, I already had two offers to run this nice, little race. An essential part of the Oregon Experience, they said.

Running and camaraderie and a big beach party! A can't-miss event, and it's this weekend! You don't want to wait a whole 'nother year, do you?

I didn't. Couldn't miss it.

And so I found myself part of team No. 79, `Travel Oregon,' crammed into an SUV with five people I'd just met. Driving and then running, driving and then running. And eating, sort of - candy bars and bananas and cheese sticks and cheap trail mix. And did I mention driving and then running?

Sleeping? It was mentioned somewhere in the sales pitch. Something about a cornfield, under the stars. But romantic turned quixotic in a hurry. Several hundred of my new best friends and I bedded down, just before sunup - as a light mist fell.

Another few hundred people milled around, saying important things loudly. And about an hour after we lay down, the European guys from the team next to us got up and began their morning routine - smoking cigarettes.

So you ask, how did I like Hood to Coast? Loved it. Every grueling hour, minute and second - 31 hours, 16 minutes, 13 seconds to be exact.

Did I mention `Travel Oregon' wasn't fast? Though really, shouldn't a team sponsored by a tourism board take time to enjoy the trip?

Eventually, we ran together across the finish line at Seaside. Appropriately, in a light rain. Then, we sat around in the same weather, laughing at instantly tall tales.

Back to Leg No. 20. The 5.75-mile distance wasn't daunting. But it's one of five legs rated `Very Hard.' Team co-captain Martin Stoll considers it the hardest. When he offered it to me - you know, to fully experience the H2C - he barely stifled a wicked chuckle.

Martin mentioned something about a flashlight. And that one of the other runners would lend me a bandana. None of which registered.

Not until around 2 a.m. Saturday. According to the map, we had traveled a little more than half of the 197-mile route. We were a few miles west of St. Helens, a few miles east of Mist - the hamlet, not the droplets. But as I took off running, it could have been the dark side of the moon.

The route twisted and turned and climbed 500 feet in two miles. Then the asphalt ended. The dust rose. The hill kept rising. I kept running.

Between gasps, I considered what I'd learned. A few hours earlier, somewhere east of Portland, I'd realized it does get hot here, after all. But it cools down nicely, too. Out here in the country, it gets really dark. And how did I forget batteries? And will this hill ever end?

Finally, I reached the summit. A dozen feet ahead, another runner was barely visible. Suddenly, the beam from his flashlight began sweeping more quickly, more violently. He had picked up the pace.

So I did, too. We raced together, crunching pell-mell through the dust and darkness. Not sure where we were headed. Or how to get there.

But loving every blind step of the Oregon Experience.