Reminds me of one time when I was camping in Yosemite Valley. Summer, so I just tossed my bag on the ground. Then I picked it up, move the pine cones out of the way, and tossed it down again. Slept like a log -- which point will become important later.
Now Yosemite had brown bears (in a goodly variety of colors), but no grizzlies, so they could only eat people one at a time. Wise campers gave them some room, but so long as you didn't get between a sow and her cub there's rarely any trouble.
My father was a cautious man, but far from a dangerous our short-tempered one. Nevertheless, he felt it prudent to carry a handgun while camping. It had proved valuable on a couple of prior occasions when drunken campers needed some additional encouragement to move along. He preferred his 9mm for this, as the large diameter barrel made a better impression.
We were camping near some friends who did not share my father's cautious approach to life. Indeed, they were exactly the sort of SG who invent new ways to cause trouble for themselves, feeling it preferable to boredom. Thus they decided to leave some leftovers out on a table to see if they could attract some bears.
Yeah, not real bright they weren't. Unfortunately, it worked.
My father was awakened by the Wrong Sort of Noise. He looked out of the tent and saw the Wrong Sort of Bear munching on those leftovers -- the Wrong Sort of Bear being in this case any bear at all.
So, he elected to try and encourage the bear to leave, but to do so quietly so others wouldn't be awakened, or worse jump up and rile the bear. He did so by making hissing noises and shining a flashlight at the bear from the "safety" of his tent.
In retrospect, this wasn't the best possible approach. In the words of one local ranger, "Bears tend to charge a light." Fortunately for all, this bear charged rather slowly, and stopped with his nose but an inch from the mosquito net tent door.
Father turned off the flashlight.
Bear sniffed the tent at great length, while my father wondered how he would explain to the rangers the presence at his campsite of a bear with a number of 9mm holes in his head. Eventually, the bear decided the contained no edibles, and shuffled off into the night.
In the direction of my sleeping bag.
I awoke the next morning to find myself surrounded by a rather large number of my fellow campers, all looking at me with varying levels of serious concern. One finally poked me with a toe and asked if I was okay.
"Is there some reason I shouldn't be okay?" I demanded of them. They didn't answer, but several pointed to the middle of my sleeping bag, about where my stomach would have been while asleep.
The bag had a very large, and somewhat muddy footprint. The bear had stepped on me as he left the camp.
Now, how many of you remember what I said earlier about sleeping like a log? Yeah, I figured only a few of you would remember. In any event, I credit my woodly sleep habit for avoiding the confrontation with that bear that would surely have resulted had I been awakened by his passage and protested.
So the next time you see someone sleeping *very* soundly indeed, just remember -- it's a valuable survival skill in bear country.
