I don't think goretex gaiters are vital to your outfit. I've never seen people wearing gaitors while hunting. If you need them, the snow is very deep or you are standing out in a blizzard. You won't walk very far in deep snow. You don't need to bother hunting during a blizzard -- just rest up in camp and try to be ready to go out hunting AFTER the blizzard breaks. The elk will be holed up in deep cover during the blizzard. After the blizzard, however, it may be very difficult to hunt the elk because of the deep snow.
It sounds like you have the general low down on what is needed to get out there and hunt. The remaining ticklish subject is how to find elk. If you can find elk -- see them -- then you can hunt them or stalk them and shoot one. That one detail of finding elk is probably the hardest thing and the thing least talked of in hunting books or magazines! These texts are always focused on equipment -- maybe because their sponsors are equipment retailers or equipment manufacturers?
So . . . do pay attention to the other things -- equipment, fitness, etc. -- but remember the one thing that may be the most difficult is finding the elk.
If you can get out to your hunting area this summer that would be great. You mention someone gave you a pointer where to find elk. Check that out. It is important to hunt away from roads -- any road that is reasonably navigable. Other hunters can drive up these roads and go hunting off the roads. If you are at least a mile away from the closest road your chances will be better. When you are in the area you have been alerted to, look for edges between heavy timber and open ground. These are good places to look for elk -- food close to security cover. Look for elk tracks -- in the open or back in the woods.
Try to find out from others -- on this web site and others -- what their best knowledge is about where elk are found. I don't mean at coordinate XXX, YYY I mean on ridges, in saddles, in engleman spruce but not in douglas fir (this is just an example, I have no reason to think this is true), that kind of stuff. I'm still learning that, so don't have much advice to give. My belief is that really skilled elk hunters are able to elminate 90% of the landscape as not attractive or suitable to elk and then focus on the remaining 10% that is most likely to contain elk.
Once you find the elk, they are liable to stay put unless you scare them away. If it isn't the last day of the season, if you are not in position to stalk or hunt them -- it is 6:15 PM, they are 1000 feet above you and 2 miles away on the mountain -- think about a plan that gives you a chance to get close the next day. It is better to hunt down onto them from above. Expect them to sleep in thick trees and go to open pastures or meadows to feed just before sundown and just before sunup. If they are bedded down in sight but are unapproachable -- a herd of 20 elk have 40 eyes, 40 ears, and 20 noses, and only one of these needs to mark you to result in all the elk flushing -- think about where they may go when they get up from their beds and position your self to intercept them.
Again, talk to others to harvest their wisdom and experience. Not too many will give up sweet spots, but most will tell you techniques and principles, to the extent they have understood and systematized what has worked for them. Sometimes, though, you just get lucky and you don't know why you stumbled into some elk, you are just thankful and happy.