Seeing a grizzly bear can be the highlight of any trip to the mountains but sometimes the excitement of those encounters can lead people to make bad decisions.

A photographer from Chestermere captured a man getting within a meter or two of an adult grizzly bear feeding along highway 1A on Sunday.

The man can be seen taking a picture of himself with the bear and a few minutes later, two more people are spotted getting out of their cars close to the feeding animal.

Ray Blanchard took video of the incident and says the most unbelievable part of the whole encounter wasn't recorded.

He says that the man actually leaned over the bush with his phone to get a picture of the bear from above and that if he'd dropped the phone it would have hit the feeding bear.

The bear was remarkably tolerant but it's a dangerous situation for the bear and for people.

"That bear tolerated that at that time. If that bear was defending a carcass, if that was a female with cubs, if that was a different day of the week when something else was bothering that bear, it may be completely intolerant," said Bill Hunt, Resource Conservation Manager, Parks Canada.

The bear is trying to gain weight after hibernating for the winter and encounters with people can create stress and may force the bear off the food source before it is ready.

Parks has been trying to control roadside behaviour for years by increasing education, enforcement and public outreach.

“It’s discouraging to see that, in many cases that message has either not been heard or not well received,“ said Hunt.

Blanchard says he hopes sharing the video will make people think twice about what they're doing.

"I like people and I like the bears.  Since the bears are on the increase I would hate for the national parks to think they have to destroy these bears to protect people. What I’ve always done is when I’m close to a bear I stay in the car,” said Blanchard.  

Park wardens could fine people in these situations for harassing wildlife and the penalty can be up to $25,000, but those fines are relatively rare.