If you tell someone you’re headed to Roatan, blank stares and a questioning look are sure to be the immediate response. This little island off the north coast of Honduras in the turquoise Caribbean waters has not found itself on many tourists bucket lists… yet. Roatan has been a scuba divers destination since the early 90s, with more dive sites within 100yds of the island’s shoreline than I’ve seen anywhere in the world. Lucky for me, my wife, Courtney, had always knew about this little slice of paradise and we planed our diving trip here for 2025!
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
Setting out from Washington D.C. to check off my buddy Ben’s bucket list item of riding all the way to Pittsburgh on the C&O and GAP trails. We also, easily, convinced our other college friend Pat to join us. Over the 4 days, we had such a blast riding this trail and cannot recommend it enough to those who enjoy riding, scenery, history, and nature. Long days in the saddle and so much American history viewed along the way.
The C&O section of trail, that runs from D.C. to Cumberland, Maryland is a cinder gravel trail that is mostly smooth. Following alongside the Potomac, you pass through a history of this country. One where towns relied heavily on their proximity to a navigable river, or in this case, a canal to ferry goods inland from the port cities. These small towns, once wealthy from extraction industries like coal, are all a shell of themselves and depend mostly on weekend tourism from the nearby cities.
The Great Allegheny Passage, or GAP trail, that runs from the continental divide downhill to Pittsburgh ended up being mostly paved, with a handful of crushed gravel sections. Nearly complete opposite from the previous days trail of rural, remote riding, the GAP trail cuts through one old town to the next.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
One of the best parts about living in a ski town is the shoulder seasons, when you can combine multiple sports into a single day. Well, once the ski resort closes down for the year, it’s the perfect opportunity to combine biking and ski touring. Though we wanted to ride from our house, the spring melt made our route to cross the highway impassible, so we started from in town. After loading up the bikes, we headed up to Park City Ski Resort to tour up the last bits of snow to the summit of Jupiter Peak for an epic day out with a good buddy!
The entire journey was about 22 miles, with a total elevation gain of almost 3,700 ft, including the bike portion. I was shocked, to be honest, that I was able to make it all the way up to the peak and back, while skiing moderately well once I put the GoPro away! It was such a blast being able to ski my favorite line at Park City Mountain called Main Chute off the top of Jupiter peak without anyone else being remotely close to us. It felt like we had the entire resort to ourselves… and that Grouse of course. Luckily, my legs didn’t bonk until the last 1/4 mile on the rail trail while riding directly into the wind. So I’ll definitely take that as a win!
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
After 26 hours of traveling to Thailand, we finally reached our hotel in Bangkok! After wandering around Chinatown and Bangkok for the day, all that travel was completely worth it! We explored the tremendously busy weekend markets, wandered through critter-filled parks, and capped off our day walking up and down the streets of Chinatown to experience the world famous street food scene. We tried as many foods as we possibly could, but we only scratched the surface of what Bangkok has to offer. The city itself was so busy and chaotic, we’d experienced nothing like it in America or anywhere else. But for how hectic the Bangkok was, it was shockingly friendly and easily accessible! Here is a video from just our first day in Bangkok on our 14 day trip! Later in the trip we made it down to the beaches of Phuket and even experienced life on a liveaboard dive boat for a few days! Thailand was unforgettable.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
Grandaddy Lake, located in the Uinta Mountains, might be the perfect weekend backpacking trip. After a short hike over Hades Pass, the view of the basin below filled with alpine lakes is unforgettable. And once you reach the shoreline of Grandaddy Lake, you will get to choose from a nearly unlimited number of areas to camp for the weekend. And having gone up there on the Labor Day weekend, which I thought would be busy, turned out to be completely empty, making it the perfect weekend of backpacking.
The roundtrip hike to Grandaddy Lake, via the Grandview Trail, is a 7.2 mile hike with only 1,300 feet of vertical to climb. Not difficult by most hike or backpacking standards, but this trail starts at 9,730feet and goes up to 10,645feet in elevation. The air is thin and the trail is steep, making it shockingly more difficult than I expected, especially with a heavy backpack on. But the adventure starts long before the trailhead, because once you turn off main road, there is 6.2 miles of bumpy dirt road that has to climb up over 2,000 feet.
The plan for our backpacking trip was to head up Saturday morning, spend two nights, then return home on Monday morning. We brought with us our dog, fly fishing rods, and most importantly, our Kokopelli Packrafts! And as we left the trailhead, heading uphill, we felt ever ounce of weight we were bringing with us for a weekend of adventure and fun. Luckily, the approach hike was beautiful and went by rather quickly. We left the valley behind us, passing other backpackers and day-hikers using the trail. And once we climbed up to the top of Hades pass, we could see we were going to be in for one incredible weekend.
From the pass, we could see the entire basin below, filled with alpine lakes surrounded by 10,000foot mountain peaks. The most stunning of these, of course, would be the largest lake in the Uintas, Grandaddy Lake. And we cruised on down to the water’s edge to see it up close and personal, and of course to find a campsite for the weekend. The lake was bigger, and more stunning than we could have ever imagined, and the best part was it was completely empty! So after we found a flat spot, with a fire ring, 200feet away from the water, we setup our camp! Starting with getting our heavy packs off our shoulders, followed by setting up our 10 year old 2-person backpacking tent. To which, we broke the zipper in the progress.
We didn’t let that slow our weekend down! The rest of that evening and the following day were spent perfectly slow. We inflated the packrafts and paddled out onto that empty lake with the dog in tow. We explored a few of the island on the lake, paddling from one to the other, getting off to hike around and imagine camping on one of them one day. The water was calm, soothing, and blue! Contrasting perfectly with the green pines that surrounded the lake’s edge and below the tan and white rocky ridge lines above.
We took our shot at fly fishing at the bank of the lake, with not much luck. Because even when we don’t catch anything, we still love to cast the fly into the water. Courtney had at least some luck with her choices of flies, getting the fish to hit, but not much luck getting them to bite anything. Maybe we’ll have to switch over to bait casting, because other fishermen we passed on the trail in had caught. A ton of fish they sustained on for the entire weekend. It didn’t matter, we still had fun.
Each night ended the same way, with a mountain house meal, cooked with our JetBoil camp stove. We ate them sitting on rocks at the lakeside, as we watched the setting sun crest over the mountains to the West. The orange and red light beamed off the mountains above, reflecting off the water below. And with the setting sun, came the dropping of temperatures, plummeting from the warm 70s of the day, down to the cold, upper 30s throughout the night. I was not packed for those temps, foolishly I had only brought shorts and didn’t pack anything warmer than a mid-layer! Regretting that decision when I awoke with frozen toes, but at least Gregor seemed to get a great night’s sleep between us in that small 2-person tent.
The last morning, we woke to the view of a glassy lake surface, almost as reflective as a mirror. It almost made us forget how heavy the backpacks were when we put them back on for our hike out. But luckily, the hike uphill was short to the top of the pass, then it was all downhill back to the trailhead. On the way down, we reminisced about drinking the beers at camp that we had chilled by sitting in the stream that ran through camp. We talked about how the stars shined bright in the cloudless night’s sky. And how perfect of the Labor Day Weekend hiking to Grandaddy Lake was. And like every beautiful, destination in Utah we’ve been to, I can’t wait to go back.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
For years I’ve starred up at the canyon wall that surround the town of Moab, wondering what exactly is up there any how could I get there. Well, a few weekends ago, I found out exactly how, and it was followed by one of the best days on a mountain bike I’ve ever had. I’m talking about the classic trail link-up of Mag7 to Gold Bar to Portal. Each of these three trails is unique and incredibly challenging for drastically different reasons. And 5 1/2 hours later, my two friends and I were back at the truck, exhausted, and ready for a beer to cap off an incredible day on the bikes.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
What if I told you there was another place, equally as stunning as those hikes in Utah’s National Parks, that you could have all to yourself. Well that place is called Yant Flat or Candy Cliffs. And these cliffs are just outside of St. George in Southwest Utah.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
In this new series, Campfire Stories, I wanted to capture some of my favorite funny and crazy moments from trips I’ve been on.
“900 feet above the ground from where I stepped off the deck and onto the first holds of the route. That’s when it finally hit me. The wave of accomplishment, stoke, and relief. We’d spent nearly the entire day on this wall, 7 hours to be exact, and our ascent was finally over. Even though it’s only rated a 5.8, the 6 pitches of the climb were one adventure after next. And for my first time on the Red Rocks of Vegas, it was one helluva trip.”
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
In this new series, Campfire Stories, I wanted to capture some of my favorite, funny, and crazy moments from trips I’ve been on. For my first one, I wanted to tell you about how everything went from epic, to horrendous, for my buddy Yuta in a matter of minutes on my trip to Iceland. Check it out, and let me know what you think!
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
Every Friday I will be now posting a Photo or Video of the Week. Here I’ll be sharing the details on how I got the shot or shots, where I was, and the backstory that went into it. I hope you find this enjoyable, and helpful in your own photography and filmmaking.
Hi there, my name is Zachary Kenney and I’m an adventure filmmaker & photographer. My passion is to tell stories that will hopefully motivate you to go live a more adventurous life. Whether that is to experience the view from the summit of a mountain, or wandering through a new town on a road trip. Currently based in the Park City, Utah.
