Alaska has a way of ruining ordinary adventures.
Our private expeditions are Alaska without compromise: wildly remote routes, serious challenge, extraordinary lodges, bush planes, helicopters, boats — whatever it takes to build the trip of a lifetime.
Every journey is designed from scratch and personally guided by Indigo’s owner. No canned itineraries. No shortcuts. Just the wildest version of Alaska we can dream up, with exceptional comfort where it counts.
Rugged luxury. Real wilderness. Fully carbon neutral. If you can dream it, we can probably make it happen.
If Alaska has found its way into your thoughts, it’s usually not random…
People don’t daydream about this place because they want another trip.
They do it because something in them is ready for scale. For quiet. For being a little less buffered from the world.
And Alaska delivers…
You’ll dream about it for decades. Tapping out of the world for a while. Walking through landscapes that still feel ancient and truly wild. Letting the remoteness sink into your bones. Watching the endless spring light move across the alder. Hearing wolf pups yip from their dens. Watching bears catch salmon returning upriver. For a little while, letting the rest of the world disappear.
Photos by Will Koeppen
What we offer
Every trip is built from scratch. Here are a few places we might start.
Backpacking trips
You move camp. You carry your world with you. These trips tend to attract people who like effort, rhythm, and the feeling of earning their evenings.
Basecamp trips
You return to the same camp each night. You explore widely during the day, then come back to a place that slowly becomes familiar. These trips still involve real days and real terrain — just with more spaciousness built in.
Lodge Combo Trips
Finish any of our wilderness trips at some of the most epic wilderness lodges anywhere on earth.
AK National Park Wilderness Sampler
We rent the plane. You pick the parks. We spend two nights deep in the wilds of each — two parks, four parks, all eight. It just depends how far you want to take it.
Bears, Whales, and Caribou
We string together Alaska’s wildest places for the best possible chance to see its most iconic animals — on their turf, far from the crowds.
You could just go to a lodge. But you didn’t come all the way to Alaska to stay put.
You could take a cruise. You could spend a week at an incredible lodge. And honestly, both sound pretty great. We just think the best version of Alaska goes deeper.
We’ll take you far beyond the roads, trails, and crowds — then bring you back to a beautiful lodge, a great meal, and a hot shower. The wild part stays truly wild. The comfortable part is genuinely comfortable.
Our Partner Lodges
After a week deep in the wild, a hot shower, spectacular meal, and real bed hit differently. We partner with some of Alaska’s most extraordinary wilderness lodges — Ultima Thule, Iniakuk Lake Lodge, Tordrillo Mountain Lodge, and Windsong Wilderness Retreat — places where world-class food and warm hospitality somehow exist at the edge of nowhere. The wilderness stays wild. You just get to come home to something exceptional.
For the love of bush planes
There’s a saying in Alaska… fly an hour or walk a month. Bush planes are half the magic. They take us where roads end and trails never started — over glaciers, braided rivers, and mountains without names, landing on gravel bars and tundra in the middle of nowhere.
The wildlife can be unreal
The wildlife can be unreal. Walk the coast with bears. Camp in the path of migrating caribou. Watch humpbacks bubble-net feed just offshore. Hear wolves calling across the tundra. Not from a bus or viewing platform — right there, in the middle of their world.
Professional photographers on every journey
Put your phone away and actually be there. We’ll capture the big moments and the quiet ones, so you can stay fully present — and come home with photographs you’ll treasure for decades.
THE BEST GUIDES IN THE INDUSTRY
Jack Bynum
Jack Bynum
Owner | Lead Guide
Jack has over a decade of experience guiding backcountry trips around the world. He has traveled over 20,000 miles by bike, sea kayak, foot, raft, and skis, become the youngest person to solo Denali and has put up first ascents in the Himalayas. In 2016 his solo ascent of Bhandar Lek was listed as one of 20 most significant global ascents of the year by the Piloet d’Or. He has 15+ years of training in remote wilderness medicine and wilderness rescue and is an AMGA certified Rock Guide. Really though, he loves going to the mountains to laugh, to connect deeply with old and new friends, and for the chance at awe and childlike wonder.
Sam Traylor
Sam Traylor
Lead Guide
Sam has over a decade of experience guiding extended expeditions in Alaska, New Zealand, Mexico and Patagonia. He’s a super accomplished climber, mountaineer, sea kayaker and backpacker in addition to being a ski patroller and highly trained wilderness medicine practitioner. He’s also just a super sweet human.
When he’s not working in wild places, you can find him traveling, cooking, and practicing bushcraft. He continues to find wilderness both a physical and metaphysical place, and finds the most value in seeing the ways that human beings change and adapt in austere environments.
Celine Jaccard
Celine Jaccard
Lead Guide
Celine Jaccard is one of the most prolific adventurers around. She’s kite-skied across Greenland, circumnavigated Baffin Island, and guided first ascents in Antarctica as an IPGA certified polar guide. She’s also an international wilderness medicine instructor and remote medic for arctic build sites. Most importantly, she does it all with a humble and joyous attitude and with ritual evening dance parties. She splits her time between her home in Baffin Island, Patagonia, Antarctica, and adventures in all corners of the globe.
Ben Luedtke
Ben Luedtke
Lead Guide
Originally from Wisconsin, Ben has spent the past decade roaming the West Coast in search of big adventure. He’s guided mountaineering expeditions on Denali, Aconcagua, Kilimanjaro, Rainier and many other mountains around the globe. Guests unequivocally rave about Ben’s kind, compassionate, and patient temperament. They have conflicting reviews about his dad jokes. Whenever he’s not climbing or guiding he’s headed somewhere in his truck with his dog Echo. Echo loves long adventures out in the snow and string cheese (if you have any).
Richard Forbes
Richard Forbes
Lead Guide
Richard has been guiding people through wild places since 2011, with hundreds of days spent backpacking, rafting, climbing, skiing, and generally getting very far from pavement. He’s guided off-trail trips across Alaska and the American West, including multiple expeditions in Gates of the Arctic. When he’s not guiding, he works as an environmental storyteller and photographer, which means he’s just as excited about the landscapes we’re traveling through as he is about finding a good route through them. Expect lots of curiosity, good conversation, and an extremely high tolerance for bad weather.
Delicious Food and Expert Logistics
Eat ridiculously well in ridiculously remote places. Behind the scenes, we handle every flight, transfer, meal, lodge, permit, and contingency — so the only thing you have to think about is the adventure.
Why Alaska tends to linger
John Muir once suggested people save Alaska for last, because once you experience wilderness at this scale, it changes how everything else feels.
It’s true. There’s really no other place like it on Earth.
WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING
“I have travelled the entire world, every continent, with dozens of high-end guide services and this was hands down the best trip of my life. The place worked it’s way into my soul. And Jack was the best guide i’ve ever had! It was hard, but so so worth it.”
“It’s impossible to explain how vast the place is. Every square mile would be it’s own national park if it were in the lower 48! I’m so grateful I got the chance to go here and so glad I chose IAG to go with.”
“Jack had me cracking up the entire time! Alaska is no joke. If you’re willing to put in the effort it’s absolutely worth it. And if you go you might as well laugh the entire time while you’re at it. I can’t recommend Indigo Alpine Guides or Gates of the Arctic highly enough.”
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
Reach out. We’re always happy to chat.
