Untitled

NATURE

Hodges (above) in survival mode during a class demonstration for natural camouflage. (Opposite page) Hodges at Steamer Lane.

AUGUST 10-16, 2006

force

liff Hodges is not an easy

guy to pigeonhole. On

one hand, he is well-

schooled and

tech-savvy—he earned a

bachelors and a masters

degree in electrical engi-

neering from the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in

just five years. On the other, Hodges is stuck

in the Mesolithic stone age. He makes fire by

friction, hunts using homemade stone tip

weapons, and tans animal hides.

What Hodges has done with himself can

be looked as a case study in that semi-mythi-

cal aphorism that usually exists only in

motivational office posters and

Rocky

movies.

I’m talking about reaching for the stars, follow-

ing your dreams, and all those other adages

that tend to not actually mean anything. If you

happened to catch a look at Hodges’ yoga

mat, it reads “Live Your Vision,” which could

be equally as meaningless as any other moti-

vational words if Hodges’ hadn’t ripped it free

of irony and, bless his heart, actually lived it.

At 26, the Santa Cruz local has tossed

aside the conventional to live his dream,

which, in his case, is being the proud owner of

Adventure Out, an outdoor programming com-

pany that specializes in wilderness survival

training, rock climbing, backpacking and—

another love of Hodges’—surfing.

“My two favorite things in the world are

one, to be outdoors, and two, to teach,” he

says. “The company provides me with the

opportunity to do both.”

Hodges doesn’t look like your typical

business owner. Adventure Out has no office,

so he has no reason to wear a tie. The

“office” is pretty much wherever Hodges feels

like working—the administrative work is

designed to be “mobile,” so he can work in

his home, on the road, or in the great out-

doors. When he conducts outdoor lessons,

work attire is either a wetsuit or pants that he

doesn’t mind getting dirty. So it’s the T-shirt-

and-jeans look for Hodges, a far cry from the

Brooks Brothers guise that you might expect

from an MIT graduate.

By his own admission, Hodges is a talker.

I tagged along on one of Adventure Out’s surf

lessons early one Saturday morning. Hodges

began the lesson the same way he does with

practically all of his classes—with a story.

Sitting on the beach, arranged in a semi-circle,

Hodges told the class about his first wave. “I

remember everything so crystal clear, like it

was five minutes ago because it was such an

influential moment in my life,” Hodges said.

“And I know that I was smiling from ear to ear.

I was so unbelievably stoked that I knew from

that moment that I would be a surfer for the

rest of my life.”

Everybody in the group nodded politely,

even though they were a bit too groggy at

eight in the morning to fully appreciate the

story. But it was clear what he intended to

do—tell us about his first wave to put into

context what we were about to do. But as

surf virgins, these sorts of things just can’t

be explained.

After basic surf lessons on dry land,

Hodges and his fellow instructors (local surfers

Tiffany Morgan and Sonrisa Steeptath) led us

into the water. Once we were arranged above

a friendly break out past the jetty, surf school

really began.

The instructors waded in the neck-deep

water right at the wave’s sweet spot. They

called out for you to get into position as the

swell came. Usually they gave you a helpful

shove to get you going at the right speed, and

once the wave arrived, as you felt its momen-

tum, you executed the pop-up-to-a-crouch

maneuver you’ve spent so much time practic-

ing on the beach. If you were lucky, and if

your balance was right, you’d be surprised to

find yourself rushing right along with the

wave—honest to-god surfing.

When the wave’s momentum died down,

and you bailed out into the waist-deep water,

you’d look back toward the group to check if

anybody saw you do what you just did. There,

just past the waves, was Hodges—just his face

bobbing up over the water with a congratula-

tory fist in the air, grinning from ear to ear.

Later, Hodges would tell me that that sort

of thing is the best part of his job. “I get to

get take people out into the water and see

that look on their face when they catch their

first wave,” he says. “That makes it so unbe-

lievably worth it.”

EESSSSOONN

LLAANNSS

With a growing business, plenty of out-

door time, and doing it all in his hometown of

Santa Cruz, Hodges appears to be happy with

the direction of his life. But it wasn’t always

that way.

In the fall of 1998, just after graduating

from Santa Cruz High, he boarded a plane

heading east to Boston, a city he had never

been to before. “You get into a school like MIT

and you have to go. You can’t really split hairs

on that one.”

But top among Hodges concerns about

MIT wasn’t necessarily the academic rigor. “I

was thinking, ‘Jesus! Am I going to be able to

surf? Am I going to be able to be outdoors

even? It’s so cold in the wintertime.’”

Through a stroke of fortune, he met a fel-

low MIT student named Kai McDonald who

hailed from the Mount Madonna area. They

shared not only a common homeland, but a

love for surfing that bordered on a necessity.

“There’s a lot nerdy characters at MIT,”

McDonald remembers. “The whole scene is

Nerd Pride—that’s the battle cry. It was refresh-

ing to meet some like Cliff.”

The duo managed to find some surf spots

out in New Hampshire and Rhode Island. Every

weekend—when there were waves—they

drove to the beach. “It taught me that surfing

was a labor of love when you’re wearing seven

millimeter wetsuits hiking through the snow to

get to the beach,” he says, “you’ve got to love

it because it’s not that fun.”

Hodges indulged in plenty of surf trips,

but he also put in plenty of studying. And

though he managed to get good grades, it

became increasingly clear that his heart just

THE “OFFICE” IS PRETTY MUCH WHEREVER HODGES

FEELS LIKE WORKING—THE ADMINISTRATIVE WORK IS

DESIGNED TO BE “MOBILE,” SO HE CAN

WORK IN HIS HOME, ON THE ROAD,

OR IN THE GREAT OUTDOORS.

AUGUST 10-16, 2006

Santa Cruzan Cliff Hodges tossed aside

the conventional for a life of adventure.

Now he’s riding the wave of his life.

bbyy HHeennrryy JJoonneess

wasn’t in it. He’d make extended weekend

sojourns to indulge in outdoor activities and it

was during this time that Hodges gained an

interest in survival training. He connected with

a survival expert named Bill McConnell, who,

in the Pine Barren forests of New Jersey, taught

Hodges the finer points of making fire, shelter,

and hunting.

“Bill teaches wilderness survival from a

purely native, indigenous aspect,” Hodges

explains. “Not like Outward Bound where

they teach you how to use a compass and

a water filter, but full-on Native American

style survival.”

There, he learned how to make stone-

point arrows and spears, as well as knives out

of obsidian and animal bone. He could make

bow drill kits out of pieces of wood and plant

fiber to make fire by friction. He could hunt

with these tools, then skin and cure the fur

using the emulsified oils of the animal’s brain.

His skill of tool-making has developed

into his own art. Last year, the Cultural Council

of Santa Cruz County featured Hodges’ native

style tools—formed and decorated using only

natural materials—in Open Studios.

The man insists on teaching as much of

the Adventure Out’s outdoor skills classes as

he can. “That’s really the class where I see

people making a connection with the natural

environment,” he notes. “I can see the shift in

people’s minds and their eyes light up when

they see a whole new way of thinking. It’s so

innately human.”

But it’s even more than that. Not a reli-

gious man in the conventional sense, Hodges

finds that outdoor survival skills give him a

kind of “spiritual connection.” A few weeks

ago, when I sat in on a Fire by Friction class

one Sunday morning at De Laveaga Park,

Hodges explained that before he begins the

process of fire-by-friction, which can be physi-

cally rigorous and not always successful, he

always takes a moment to close his eyes and

say a prayer. “It doesn’t always work,” Hodges

notes, “but the few times I didn’t do that, I

guarantee you, I didn’t get it a flame.”

Because he could only manage to get out

of Boston during the weekends, he had to

bring some of the skills back with him.

He would sit on his board shorts in the

middle of winter trying to start a fire on the

floor. In the freezer: a bag of deer brain that

he used to tan leather.

Hodges’ attention was drifting. He came

to realize that engineering may not have been

something he was passionate about, but

something he was just good at.

OOSSTT

--CC

OOLLLLEEGGEE

LLUUEESS

After graduating, Hodges made his way

back to Santa Cruz, where he spent his days

giving surf lessons for Girls Adventure Out, an

outdoor company geared at women only. Soon

enough, he came to terms with what he knew

anyway—that being a surf instructor wasn’t

going to pay the bills. So, not knowing what

else to do with his masters in electrical engi-

neering from MIT, he landed a “classic

Office

Space

job” in Silicon Valley where he morphed

into the tech marketing manager for a firm

that produced flash memory. “I was in a cubi-

cle in a basement under florescent lights for 10

hours a day with an hour and a half commute

each way.

“I’d be in meetings all day,” Hodges adds

with no apparent sense of nostalgia. “I told

people in one meeting what other people

talked about in an earlier one.”

Still, he had a future ahead of him. The

position paid well and had great benefits. But

he was unhappy. He lasted seven months

before quitting. “It just wasn’t for me. The

world needs engineers. I just don’t think I’m

one of them. I’ve always been the kind of per-

son who needs to be outdoors.”

Though Hodges’ parents were concerned,

they weren’t altogether surprised when he

decided he wanted to quit. Still, they were

thrown yet another curve ball when their son

explained his next plan: He wanted to buy the

struggling Girls Adventure Out company, which

had recently been put up for sale.

“They did their best to maintain the

whole ‘we want you to be happy and do what

you want,’” Hodges remembers. “But there

was some sweat on their brows.”

HIs father had Cliff talk to some of his

business savvy friends to see if it was really

something worth pursuing and the consensus

seemed to be that, in his father’s words,

“might not be unrealistic.”

There was the issue of Hodges having

no real business background. But he con-

vinced his naysayers that his vision could

come to fruition.

“When I was your age,” his father recalls

telling his son at that time, “I don’t know

whether I would have been dumb enough or

smart enough to do what you’re doing. What

happens from here on out is up to you.”

IF YOU WERE LUCKY, AND IF YOUR BALANCE

WAS RIGHT, YOU’D BE SURPRISED TO

FIND YOURSELF RUSHING RIGHT ALONG

WITH THE WAVE—HONEST-TO-GOD SURFING.

Adventure Out’s Women's Surf Class at Cowells (below). The writer of this story learns how to ride a wave (right).

Adventure Out students in Survival Class build shelter (left). A young boy learns how to create an indigenous trap.

“CONNECTING WITH THE OUTDOORS IS ONE

OF THE MORE MEANINGFUL THINGS WE CAN

EXPERIENCE AS HUMAN BEINGS.”

CLIFF HODGES

AUGUST 10-16, 2006

DDVVEENNTTUURREE

UUTT

After securing a bank loan, Hodges took the

plunge and purchased the company in the winter

of 2004. His first order of business was to cut

down on the less profitable programs, like some of

the mountain biking and backpacking trips, and

effectively doubled its market reach by dropping

the “Girls” prefix from the name. The company he

owns now is roughly 50 percent his creation and

50 percent of the existing company. What worked

in his favor was the company’s established cus-

tomer base, and the company’s permits. Adventure

Out also has the only permit to conduct surf les-

sons in Pacifica, which is one of the only beginner

surfing spot near San Francisco.

Additionally, Hodges has attempted to focus

on the individual customer’s experience. He

keeps his classes small and all if his instructors

are highly qualified.

“We don’t teach people just how to get up on

a surfboard, we try to teach them about the history

of surfing, the culture around it,” he says. “We really

try to involve our customers into the community so

they can feel a part of it and feel like stockholders.

“Connecting with the outdoors is one of the

more meaningful things we can experience as

human beings. I think there will always be some-

thing missing if you can’t strike that balance.”

Indeed, for all the time that Hodges spends

Hodges’ Rock Climbing class (below). (Right) A young girl makes natural cordage in Adventure Out’s Wilderness Skills.

“I CAN SEE THE SHIFT IN PEOPLE’S MINDS

AND THEIR EYES LIGHT UP WHEN THEY SEE A

WHOLE NEW WAY OF THINKING. IT’S SO

INNATELY HUMAN.”

CLIFF HODGES

AUGUST 10-16, 2006

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Hodges and student Aimee Vasseur create fire (left). (Below) Student Jesse Bushberg embraces the flame.

“EVERY SINGLE DAY OF MINE IS COMPLETELY

DIFFERENT. I HAVE NOT HAD TWO DAYS BE THE

SAME SINCE I STARTED THIS BUSINESS.”

CLIFF HODGES

AUGUST 10-16, 2006

connecting with the outdoors, there’s plenty of time he

spends balancing that out with good, old-fashioned

office work. He’s currently the lone administrator of

Adventure Out, so he’s in charge of the payroll, program-

ming, scheduling, and sales. “A lot of people could look

at my job and glamorize it and say wow, he gets to play

outside all day long. I get to do that sometimes, but

running a business means there’s a billion things you

have to do.”

True, he hasn’t had what you’d call a day off in a

long time, but he says he wouldn’t trade it for anything.

“I don’t have a routine,” he says. “I love the exact

opposite of routine. Every single day of mine is com-

pletely different. I have not had two days be the same

since I started this business.”

Considering the success that Hodges has had in

field that made no practical use of his MIT masters, he

maintains that he has no regrets about his decision to

go to school there. What it taught him, in addition to

electrical engineering, was work ethic.

“When I finished MIT, I came out knowing I could

do anything,” Hodges adds. “I’ve never done anything

as hard as that. Not working over the hill, running a

business, surfing a 18-foot wave—“ He stops, reconsid-

ers. “Well I don’t know if I’d say

that

. Surfing a 18-foot

wave is pretty hard to do.”

Something tells me he can handle it. ■

Learn more at adventureout.com or call (800) 509-3954.