2016 Uinta Elk?

Hello all,

I'm brand new to the forum and am looking for a little help or constructive criticism on my hunt plan for next year. Definitely not looking for honey-holes or 10 digit grids, just a point in the right direction.

I'm an active duty Marine that grew up on the east coast as a whitetail hunter but have had the fortune of being stationed on CA/NV border. I'm definitely new to western hunting but have experienced some succes knocking down a couple CA mule deer (eastern Sierra Nevadas) on solo backpack hunts and a Cow elk in CO last year out of a drop camp. Basically, I don't think I'm completely clueless and am definitely not afraid of some hard work or covering some ground.

Right now my group will consist of about 4-6 guys for the Any Bull Rifle season. I have a line on renting some horses and we plan on packing in the 7th then hunting the 8th through the 15th. I want to try to get 5-7 miles off the roads, set up camp, then hunt from there. Most of the guys I'm going with are in there late 20's as well so we plan on covering some ground to try to get on some Elk.

Right now I'm looking at the Southern Slope east towards the actuall wilderness area. My main issue is finding a step off point then a general area to set up camp. I live about 8 hours drive away, so after some serious google Earth and map work, I'm hoping to go backpack and check it out this spring.

From all the reading I have done so far, it looks like I should expect high pressure by the roads and rugged country and low elk densities in the back country.

Any suggestions or advice is greatly appreciated!

Thanks, Jon