Avenger, I said 10K+. :)
How would you spend 10k or more? Buy a multi-kilobuck contesting rig, add a legal limit amp, a tuner, a multi-frequency beam antenna, tower, rotator, hardline coax, etc.
Or, you could build a CW only HF kit (couple hundred) and a resonant wire antenna for the band of your choice (several examples here:
http://www.qrpkits.com/).
I'm somewhere in between. I have a Yaesu 817 with a bunch of mods ($1k total for radio and mods). When at home, I'm connected to a multiband vertical ($50 used, about $150 new) with about 35yds of LMR-400 coax (paid about $80 for the 50yd portion). In the field, I use a homebuilt tuner ($50) with a wire antenna of some sort (let's say about $15-$20 worth of wire and connectors).
If you forgo the internal mods of the Yaesu 819, you can frequently get one used for as little as $450. New, they're near $700.
Chris