I would love to hunt trails and move around a bit more, but try leasing 800 acres with 3 other guys and hunt this way. The more you move around, the fewer deer you have. Most landowners would prefer leasing hunters to hunt feeders simply because of the safety factors. Plus, if your lease is on marginal deer country anyway, without food plts and feeders, you start off with fewer deer. The price and number of hunters pretty much dictates how a lease is hunted.

How far are you willing to hike in, and pack out if you kill?

Outside of marginal deer country, you can still put up blinds and hunt that way. I hunt on 600 acres and have six really good spots and have four-five more smaller spots; I could easily lease to four guys that wanted to hunt OP's way. Most guys just don't want to hunt like that these days, though. They want to sit on their phones and watch a feeder. You make a good point about the safety issue and the feeder-I hadn't really thought about that.

There are three of us on my lease of 20 years. One original member has been there 27. We have blinds and feeders, but we also hunt trails and move around sometimes. We have old chairs strategically placed on trails, bluffs, field edges, in a flat of oaks, and overlooking pinch points. Some include open log brush blinds around them. One is in a clump of cedar trees for a natural blind, some are just up against a tree. A couple are on game trails that eventually lead to feeders neighboring hunters have put on our fence line. Anyone on the lease can walk to and use these chairs. We have two trails cut through creek bottoms where there are no stands or feeders that we use for still hunting. I spent the first 11 days of season at my lease and best guess I hunted vantage points on a field or off a bluff and a pinch point between a bluff and creek on 3 our of every 4 hunts. Only 1 out of 4 of my hunts was at a feeder. Over 50% of the time we walk from camp to stand and back rather than drive. We have cell phones and keep up with each other if not in camp. We know where everyone is at and will let the others know if we are moving. But we also do other types of hunting and fishing too. As laid back as can be and never had a disagreement or problem in 20 years.

No two lease groups are the same. I usually have two leases at a time and have been on other leases where every member basically was allowed only one stand to maintain and hunt and no one was allowed to hunt anywhere else but from their stand, no walking outside camp or vehicle to stand, no driving during certain hours, no small game or bird hunting, no guests, etc. And that is ok. It was what I wanted at the time for my alternate. But today my 2nd lease is even more laid back than my other one. You just have to find a lease or group that thinks like you or start your own lease, but as the lease manager keep the cards on the table and find members who will hunt the way you want.