Alsatian

If you hunt at lower elevations, this typically means hunting on private land. If you don't have any good friends who are willing to let you hunt elk on their private ranch for free, this kind of hunting will be very expensive. I you hunt on public land, you can hunt for free, but this kind of hunting will often be at higher altitudes in steep, physically challenging country. You can hook up with an outfitted/guided hunt for somewhere in the neighborhood of $4,500 and maybe and extra $500 for a license in Colorado. It sounds like you really need to do your homework on this before you commit. One recommendation would be to take a trip out to your prospective elk area and do some hiking/scouting. This would be a good way to find out precisely what the physical challenges are like. If you want to avoid dieing during your hunt, you need to be prepared and know what your physical limits are. You seem to portray yourself as out of shape -- maybe substantially overweight, unconditioned. This certainly does not comport with a do-it-yourself elk hunt. Even a horseback hunt is going to involve some high mountain hiking that will be very hard on you if you are overweight and out of condition. What about thinking of a pronghorn antelope hunt? These can be done relatively inexpensively in Wyoming (look around Gillette, unit 23) and in relatively benign topography. I'm certainly not trying to insult or offend you. Just take the physical difficulty of elk hunting very, very seriously.