I feel the same as the above posters. What are the chances of being attacked by a bear while tent camping? Quite small in most areas of the US. Even in areas of minimal bear activity if you follow all the precautions in the websites you have linked to. But in certain areas of major bear activity (ursa major?) I have changed my mind about the safety of tent camping and opt for cheap motels. And I'll tell you why.

A few years ago I was housesitting for a fellow rider and looking after his beloved dog while he rode to the BMW national rally. A couple days after he left I got an urgent call from his sister. He had been attacked in his tent by a bear the previous night and was in the hospital in Wyoming. Sister was worried and needed help figuring out the situation. Because the guy's hand had been mangled, no way he could ride the big GS. What to do?

So I hitched up his trailer to his nice new truck, loaded his dog and sister into the rig and headed off to Wyoming lickety split. We were thinking the worst. As it turned out, it was a media circus by the time we arrived in Cody, Wyoming the next day. Good morning America TV paid to put us up in a nice motel over the weekend so they could get a good live national bear attack victim story on the Monday show. So that was nice. My friend got his fifteen minutes of fame and then some.

As it turned out, he had taken all the precautions. All food and gear locked in a bearproof box. In fact the Forest Service checked his tent the next day and would have fined him if he had any food or personal care items in there, which was news to me. But they found it clean. He even locked his gun in the bear box, which was probably a good thing, since a couple wild rounds fired from inside the tent at 2 in the morning may have only made the bear angrier. It turned out to be a grizzly. My friend was camped in a campground with probably 30 campers at various campsites who heard him yelling. But it happened fast, with the bear mauling the tent and waking up my friend and chomping his hand through the tent as he was flailing away, and then miraculously heading off into the darkness. By the time the campground hosts arrived with a flashlight the bear was long gone. They took my friend for a long ride to meet up with an ambulance to the hospital for stitches to the hand. It could have been a lot worse. I can still remember all the TV trucks and camera crews. And then it was over and we were driving back to the little town of Cooke City near the campground to pick up his bike and gear, and 50 miles down to the Forest Service office to pick up his gun that was in custody for safe keeping and the long drive home. It was an unusual week. But there's no way I'm camping at that campground just north of Yellowstone, or anywhere around Yellowstone for that matter. And I got a motel heading up the Cassiar in British Columbia after seeing 6 bears scamper across the road that day, and out in Bella Coola B.C. got a cheap motel in bear country. But in most areas of the country I wouldn't hesitate to camp.

I saw in the paper this summer that someone was killed by a grizzly while camping in that VERY SAME CAMPGROUND that my friend was attacked! I couldn't believe it.

So, to sum up, while camping in bear country is probably safer on average than threading through rush hour traffic in Guatemala City or Bangkok, I personally opt for cheap motels in heavy bear country just to be on the safe side. Mind you, I am not as brave as some of you folks. I wear ATGATT and have noticed that people who ride in shorts and a tee shirt haven't done much asphalt surfing, and people who camp in major bear areas didn't see my friends hand.

Kindest regards,
John Downs

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South America and back on a 250 Super Sherpa Minimalist Adventure http://advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=831076