hill walkers and mountaineers are taught to measure distances with strides. Once you know how many steps / strides a distance is, you can measure quite accurately. Others can also start measuring distances once there is a known distance marked.

In addition, Nainsmith's rule (dating from 1892) is still used to this day - to estimate time to travel certain distances.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naismith%27s_rule