I am going on an elk hunt in CO in October of 2016.

I am in need of a bolt gun for this and any future trips. There will be many miles of trekking through mountains at high elevation. I am concerned about weight. Also, there is a good chance this rifle will take a beating. It needs to be durable. I will not be shooting strings of 50 rounds, so recoil is not an issue.

Those things being considered, I am seriously looking at the Ruger American Predator, in .308. Optic will most likely be a Leupold of some sort in 3x9. Price is preferred to be less than $1000 total. I'm somewhat flexible with that.

Why I like the Ruger on paper: It's light for a bolt gun. Threaded barrel (strong possibility of a can going on it in the future). I've heard good things through the grapevine about the American action, however have zero trigger time on it.

My question to you, brain trust of M4C, is what are the opinions of this rifle? A search revealed one thread where weight was not an issue. If there is another rifle that fits the bill, a la Rem700 AAC, I am completely open to ideas. The AAC is quite heavy from memory though.

This is my first bolt gun, and will not see any duty use besides dropping delicious 4 legged critters.