Being prepared is one thing, but being paranoid is a waste of time. I've been camping, backpacking, hiking, and hunting for over 43 years and other than when in Yellowstone and Yosemite National Parks have only seen one bear in the woods. It was crossing a road near LaVeta at night and ran the minute my headlights hit it. The best advice has already been stated before, make normal noise and don't creep around in the woods. Chances are the bear will hear you and avoid you long before you'd have a chance of seeing it.

I do have a funny bear story though. We were tent camping in a campground in Washington state back in the late 70's. At the ranger campfire and story telling session that night someone asked the ranger why the dumpsters were all chained to a concrete pad. The ranger explained that when they first switched to the big dumpsters versus the old 50 gallon trash containers they were still having bears get into them. They staked out the dumpsters and discovered bears would get a running start and smack into the dumpster to knock it off the concrete pad which turned it over, then pick through the trash for a feast. We thought that was a good story and as luck would have it that night we were awakened by a loud noise nearby. Lights from the camper next to us came on and we heard people walking around and talking. The next morning we saw our neighbor examining a large dent in the side of his camper. It seems a bear tried the ramming technique on their camper! Yet we were in a tent and never heard a thing except the loud Thump when the bear hit the camper. The campground was full of tent campers and nobody was bothered except the camper. I don't remember the type of camper he had but it must have looked like a dumpster to the bear.