If you get the chance to do preseason scouting be very careful not to spook the elk into the next zip code. Cruising for fresh sign is good but spotting them from long distance is better. Most of the sign you will find is in the timber near bedding areas or travel routes. It is pretty easy to find sign in the open parks if there is a nice new blanket of snow. A herd of elk leave a lot of tracks in the snow that can be spotted fairly easily with binoculars with out having to walk in and leave human odor.
They often do not use the same trail when going into timber like whitetail deer do but often enough they will use the same general area. If you can watch where they enter timber to go to a bedding area in the morning odds are pretty good that they will pop out of timber somewhere near there when the shadows are long in the afternoon.
Sometimes you can smell elk if the wind is right and you are not far from them. To me the smell is kind of like being around cattle.