Folks toss around phrases like “glimpse a hidden world” all the time, but the reality is, most places aren’t hidden. Hard to get to, sure. Rarely visited, okay. But hidden?

North Korea is truly hidden, off-limits as a matter of decades-long political policy. You just don’t go there, and the people there don’t leave.

But now one of the great and pioneering adventure travel companies, Mountain Travel Sobek, is taking a group of 24 people to North Korea in September. The trip is being led by one of our idols, their co-founder Richard Bangs, who started Sobek Travel after floating an uncharted, crocodile-filled African river in 1973.

Our hats are tipped, our hearts are full of envy, and if we had $9,000 on hand, we’d be off to North Korea this fall.