Meet Sean Clark | Founder of Venture Unknown Foundation

We had the good fortune of connecting with Sean Clark and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Sean, what do you attribute your success to?
Compassion….. is the single most important virtue that has unlocked the doors to having a community based organization. Finding a way to relate with our members is how we all know we are equal regardless of how different we may be. Compassion binds us to being simply human.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I founded Venture Unknown in 2020. We are an adventure group that focuses primarily on overland travel. Our guiding principles are to explore, educate, and encourage.Due to these principles we have organically grown into one of the most well known overland community in the Southeast. We have a membership of 4200 and growing very rapidly. It started as just a way for the community to get together and explore the beautiful outdoors we all are so very blessed to have. During these travels and since we have so many people who are passionate for protecting our access to the outdoors, it inspired me to create the nonprofit Venture Unknown Foundation. It’s primary focus is to organize stewardship projects all over the country. Some of these projects include cleaning up our forest, graffiti removal off of our landmarks, and building a trash trailer dubbed Oscar that has an amazing story in of itself. In 2022 Venture Unknown removed 15,000lbs of trash out of our National Forest. I am very passionate about giving back to our community. We have held events that focus on raising money for veterans, first responders, and donated tons of food to local food banks. We are just beginning and the future is bright!

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Just my type of question. I am the lead guide for Venture Unknown and love sharing fun, beautiful, and interesting places with people

I would have the copilot my 1996 Toyota Land Cruiser dubbed Bruiser. We would begin our trip at a campsite deep in the Smoky Mountain National park. When morning broke we would embark into the Harmon Den Wilderness, 4×4 over mountain tops, visit huge waterfalls, and go where only a 4×4 can take you. Once back on pavement we would meander down the beautiful Blue Ridge Parkway, which is 5000 ft up and is 400 miles long. The side trips to places off the Parkway like Looking Glass Falls, Sliding Rock, and Mt Mitchell (the tallest mountain in the East coast. Then we would travel over to Uwharrie National Forest and do some offroading that is always exciting. Afterwards we will catch a ferry to visit Cape Lookout National Seashore on the Outer Banks of North Carolina for 3 days of playing in the surf, eat great food, explore the old village, and just relax with our feet in the sand.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Encouragement is actually one of our guiding principles. Without it some would feel like their efforts don’t matter. Having someone there to lift you up, lend a hand , and push you forward is instrumental in a very real way when it comes to overlanding great distances and adversities. Our group was inspired thru the efforts made by Treadlightly. Treadlightly is a nonprofit that encourages the responsible use of the outdoors and public lands.

Website: https://www.venture-unknown.com/

Instagram: https://instagram.com/venturexunknown?igshid=NGExMmI2YTkyZg==

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VentureUnknownOverlandAdventures?mibextid=ZbWKwL

Youtube: https://youtube.com/@VentureUnknown

Other: This links to a lot of the community things I’ve created. https://linktr.ee/VentureUnknown

Image Credits
All photos are from my personal album.