Sold on ADVENTURE

Paul Saitowitz

You’ve seen them. Carabiners with clip-on flashlights and thick

pocket knives -- complete with special blades and tools suited for

gutting fish, sawing down small trees and clinging on to rocks --

dangling from their belt loops.

And there’s the fleece top, warm enough to wear while sleeping

outdoors but cool enough for a day hike; pants with more pockets than

you can imagine -- good for carrying freeze-dried packets of chicken

and rice, pasta primavera and mashed potatoes; shoes that look part

mountain, part blanket, with thick, rounded laces able to withstand

thorn-laden shrubbery or a jagged rock.

It’s the unofficial uniform of the outdoor store clerk -- the one

who can’t get enough climbing, hiking and camping, but remains

shackled just enough by the day-to-day grind of city life that

gainful employment is necessary. For most, it’s just a means to an

end, a way to get enough money for their next fix on the mountain, in

the desert or at the lake.

“If I’m not sleeping or working, I’m doing my best to get away,”

said Grant C’Debaca, who works at Adventure-16 in Costa Mesa.

“Whenever anyone that works here comes back from their day off,

they’re filled with stories about their adventures, and sharing their

physical escape allows the rest of us to mentally escape.”

Among the clerks are two types of escapists. There are the nature

lovers intoxicated by the beauty and serenity offered by the

wilderness. Then there are those who live for the next challenge to

their psyche and intestinal fortitude, thrill seekers who see nothing

but fun in dangling hundreds of feet off the ground, suspended by

little more than a rope and a makeshift hold.

While those in the former group take pride in knowing the

differences between various repellents and the categorical

discrepancies indigenous among local plants and animals, the latter

are usually the gear-heads obsessed with the latest ice tool or

rock-climbing hang board.

Still, there is a synchro- nicity that exists between the two on

the retail floor, with each innately knowing which customer is more

suited to their version of the escape. When they find that customer

with a common interest, talking about it and helping them prepare for

their adventure serves as an escape of its own.

Jack Carver, general manager of the Grant Boys in Costa Mesa --

Southern California’s oldest independent outdoors store -- started

there 36 years ago as a maintenance worker. The store’s Wild West

ambience and Carver’s thick beard and slight-and-wiry build buttress

his lifelong career choice -- he’s an outdoorsman passing time as a

salesman.

“I’d say about 25% of the people that work in this store have been

here for five years or longer, and you just don’t find that at other

types of stores,” he said. “A lot of them stay because doing this is

what they love to talk about, and these are the types of people they

want to be around.”

Another pervasive sentiment is that the managers and higher-ups at

these stores are more in tune with the lifestyle. If an employee

wants to take time off in the middle of his or her schedule to take

an extended backpacking trip, co-workers will more than likely

scramble to ensure that they are accommodated. No one wants to hear

about anyone missing an opportunity. After all, most employees revel

just as much in hearing stories about adventures as they do in

telling their own.

Paddle Power, a kayak store in Newport Beach, makes getting away

as easy as going to work. The store, situated right on the water,

gives its employees easy access to get out and paddle as often as

they can.

“I’m out there paddling about every other day,” storeowner Jim

Smiley said. “You can’t really have a store like this if you are not

into it.”

Smiley started as an employee at Paddle Power a decade ago, and

after five years on the job he bought the store from its original

owner. Before that he worked in the construction industry, and finds

that outdoor stores are mainly filled with office castaways that

“rejected cubicle life.”

That rejection is the common theme among this group, a group that

prides itself on stretching boundaries and living outside the lines.

* PAUL SAITOWITZ is a news editor. He may be reached at (714)

966-4632 or by e-mail at paul.saitowitz@latimes.com.