Skyline drive is within 90 minutes of Washington DC and Baltimore MD. Most of the weekend crowd is made up of citified lolligaggers in crisp new L.L. Bean gear who have never seen a wild animal bigger than a squirrel. This isn't the only time I've seen them go nuts over bear. Another time I watched a couple of teenagers scale a dangerous slope to get a better view of a large bear that had broken cover in a high clearing. They weren't in imminent danger from the bear, which was probably five hundred feet away from them, but if they had slipped they would have tumbled down over broken talus studded with deadfall.
I, on the other hand, could see the bruin just fine with my binoculars.