As for a rifle I'll also recommend the new Savage Weather Warrior Series. I just purchased one, equipped with the AccuStock and AccuTrigger setup's and I love it. I have my chambered in .308 but there was a .300 Win Mag I also looked at and held. Out of box performance was excellent with groups right around one inch at 100 hundred yards with cheap Winchester factory ammo.

I put a Burris FullField II scope on my Savage 3x9x40mm with the Ballistic Plex reticle. I wouldn't hesitate to take a shot out to 250 or 300 yards with my setup. I looked at scopes from $100 up to about $800 and decided I liked the $199 Burris over the Leupold VX-III I was looking at next to it. I don't know why, but the Burris seemed a lot clearer to me, I could be wrong overall but I'm just relaying my personal experience.

I will say learning to handload has been great fun, and will really improve your accuracy. I haven't shot any of my test loads for the new rifle, so I can't comment to handloaded accuracy yet, but I have a few test rounds ready for the range.