It was boring to me, and i'll give you an example of it being shooting and not hunting.

A handicapped retired sniper was taken hunting. Something he had never done before, but always wanted to do.

They got high on the mountain, and glassed an elk. The sniper laid prone, and shot the elk at 480yds with one shot.

The sniper had zero hunting skills, because he had never done it before. However, being a sniper, his shooting skills were way above average.

Now, what part of him killing that elk was hunting, and what part was shooting?

I give him all the credit in the world as a shooter. I give him none as a hunter.

That's why it was boring for me. I don't want to be a sniper. I want to hunt the animal at his own terms when all his senses can be used against me.

We all have out definition of how we view hunting, and it's challenges. We're not going to agree on them, and that's fine. Nobody is forced to hunt any method they don't like. Some think my method of still hunting is easy. Probably, because they got lucky, and walked into an animal and shot it. It's pretty well accepted as the hardest way to hunt in the hunting world, but it doesn't really matter.

I've noticed how touchy guys are who like long range hunting. They seem to find it hard to believe that someone wouldn't like their method of hunting. They developed the skills to do it, but lets be honest. Those skills are developed on the range. Shooting. Maybe some more skills are glassing. Snipers do that too.

My skills are developed in the mountains. I live at 8000ft in the Rockies. It's only 15 minutes to get to the area in the picture I posted. I scout and still hunt without a gun 300 days a year in the mountains. I don't need a gun to hunt. I can work on playing the wind, being quiet, and seeing and getting close to game, before they see me. I also work on tracking game in all kinds of ground conditions. I'll also work on shooting, but it's more on practicing taking fast and running shots.

Then of course you have hunters who are inbetween. They work the timber, but will also take long shots. Those won't usually be 500yd shots though.

So, we're all different. Pick your style, and get good at it. If someone doesn't agree with it. So what? How boring would we be if we all liked the same thing?

To the OP. If you plan on shooting an elk at 300-500yds? You better find a place to practice those distances a lot. You say you don't have any right now. I'd rather see you learn to get closer.