I was heading north on the Cassiar Highway in BC, a mostly dirt road which parallels the more heavily-traveled AK highway. I had been seeing black bears every day from a fair distance.

I was on a flat stretch of road with grassy banks. I saw a matted-down patch on my right and thought to myself, that looks like a bear slid down on its butt right there. Then I glanced to my left and found myself face to face with a grizzly.

It's funny, I knew what I was supposed to do from reading and talking about bears. But it was my experience responding to stray dogs that had trained me in how to respond. I just stayed calm and kept pedaling, same speed. It stepped into the road and huffed in my direction, but it didn't start chasing me.

I have kept that moment in mind during every "stressful" situation in my life since then.