First things first ... Newbies would be well advised to stay away from the "Canucky Tires", "Marts" and "Big Box" stores ... patronize the smaller gun shops ... you may pay a nickel or dime more ... but you'll find a wealth of experience and as often as not, good advice which seems to be lacking or totally non-existant from the clerks at the biggies. Like manbearpig related ... two clerk's who hadn't even heard of the .25-06 ... jeepers, it's been around since what, 1922 or so as a wildcat ... and in commercial form since 1969.
For the criteria you've mentioned, and a few others have alluded to ... have a look at something like a .260, 6.55x55 or 7mm-08. Tikks T3's and Remington 700's are pretty hard to beat as good, off-the-shelf rifles. These calibers with good factory loads are more than capable of what you want to do with them.