Over the festive period we enjoyed a number of walks along the river bank and canal towpath. It struck me that there is an etiquette associated with acknowledging fellow walkers which I don’t believe has ever been codified. I thought I’d consider some of the principles which seem to underpin this ‘perambulating politeness’.
First I should deal with relatively straightforward ‘campsite acknowledgment’. Campsite acknowledgement is only essential first thing in the morning when walking to and from the toilet block carrying you ablution bag and towel. The required acknowledgement is "Mornin' " and the response is the same, “Mornin’ ”. Never upgrade to “Good morning” or improvise by saying “What a lovely day” as this borders on chatty and will be viewed with the suspicion that you are a pervert or paedophile.
Moving on to the ‘riverside, canal side, hill path acknowledgement’ – this is a little trickier and includes interacting variables. At its simplest the level of acknowledgement can be expressed as a function of both the remoteness of the path and the quality of the track. So by way of illustration there is absolutely no need to acknowledge someone walking on a tarmac track in a city park (in fact so to do will at best be ignored while at worst will cause the other party to quietly reach for the security of their mobile phone). However, meeting someone on a muddy track on the hills demands an enthusiastic “Hello” with lingering look to recognise that you know you share a common bond and, if time wasn’t so pressing, you might well end up friends for life. Tracks in-between (gravel towpath by a canal, muddy riverbank tracks through a village require a “Hi” with an almost instantaneous aversion of eyes following the acknowledgment.
Now I appreciated I have merely scratched the surface of this subject and have not fully described the ‘acknowledgement gradient’ between the extremes illustrated; the 'nod' accompanied or not by a hint of a smile fits into this gradation. Additionally, I have only reflected the British ‘perambulating politeness’ code. I feel there is a least one PhD project here and fully expect a student to pick this up as field of study; fully supported by hard-pressed taxpayers of course.
