I have had several encounters with bears too. They seem to be no problem if you leave them alone. We were camping in the Blue Ridge mountains when I was a kid. I slept in the back of our 1972 Fury wagon while everyone else was in the trailer. One night I went in to the trailer to use the bathroom and the next morning my father told me that less than a minute after I went back to the car there was a full grown adult black bear at the picnic table beside the car. I must have walked right by it.