If you can get mules in it's not that rough... while funny it's true... Told Dennis about a canyon that always holds bulls, said you kill a bull at daylight easy, then two days packing it out. He said no problem, I'll use the mule, told him you can't get a mule in. He figured he could get the mule in anywhere, till we went scouting, then it was, nope, can't get a mule in there.
I grew up babysitting our cattle on our summer permit in what is now a designated wilderness area, while pushing cow ponies into places I would not do to a horse today. I try to tell people there are places a guy is not going to get a horse into.
Last year my son and I killed bulls on almost flat terrain, but the timber was so thick a guy could spend a day or more chainsawing a path for the horses back to the elk. It was a whole lot easier to don the backpacks and carry them out--luckily it was less than 45 minutes to the truck with each load.
Medium size mules or lamas can't make it over the downed timber without high centering even with the panniers empty, if they would even attempt to go over to begin with. Timber is too close together for loaded panniers to fit through. Been there and tried that in the past.
