If you could buy land anywhere in the mountains for recreational/hunting use/summer home

Southern Missouri.

But you’ll be disappointed in the quality of hunting in most Eastern mountains.

I’d go get some of those reclaimed strip mines in Kentucky, West Virginia or Virginia. They’ve been restocked with elk.

My favorite place in the world is the Yampa river valley around the town of steamboat springs, Colorado. Steamboat has the feel of a small mining town, yet there is a ski resort nearby so there are lots of restaurants, etc. short distance from town there is fly fishing, elk hunting, deer hunting and antelope hunting.

I don’t know what your budget is, but it would take a literal fortune to buy 100 acres there!

Driftless Area

I hunt the mountains of NC and can confirm that the deer and turkey populations are fairly low compared to the flatland areas I hunt (tons of bear though). Also, the western-most counties of NC have no doe season and only allow you to kill 1 buck per year, so keep that in mind during your search for land.

Many of the mountain counties also have very short rifle and muzzleloader seasons, typically 5 days long or so, depending on where you are, so archery is going to be your main option.

Western NC is wonderful in many ways, but the hunting is harder than anywhere else in the country I’ve been.

The bucks can get big, but not because of superior genetics or ideal food sources. It’s because they have so many places to hide from hunters, like rhododendron thickets, so they can get old. And they tend to bed on knobs, facing downhill, with the wind to their backs coming from uphill, so they can smell anything coming from behind them and see anything in front of them from a mile away. Very challenging to hunt these bucks.

Montana and there’s not a close second for me. The biggest wild country left in the continental U.S. Yellowstone drove up the prices, and there’s a big $ difference in a property that has snow plow service and one that doesn’t. I tried to make it work but decided it’s just too damn far for me at this stage of life.

I don’t know about the hunting part but after getting back from my third summer trip to Montana it’s hard not to love that state. I have yet to spend much time in the tourist trap areas like Bozeman and such. Spent a few nights in Whitefish.

However the rural Montana parts I’ve seen I’ll keep going back and maybe even have a place. Hunting it would be totally secondary. It’s just an amazing state that has just about everything IMO.

I would look hard at northern New Mexico. You will probably get more bang for the buck there.

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Are these types of places even available?

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Do yourself a search, there are NUMEROUS places all over the high prairie out West. Just have to sut in the time to find one

Crook County