Is it disrespectful to stroll around a cemetery?

[FuckConvoGiveMeAForest]

Only on the footpath obviously. Not visiting, just walking through it. The trees and birds etc... so peaceful. But is it wrong? I'm in two minds 🤔

Not at all. If we don’t use these places they will become unusable. The cemetery my relatives are in is terrible due to council cut backs.

Glad to hear the jogger got a rollicking! A cemetery near me sadly is used as a short cut by drivers no it upsets me and makes me think of kids who would use it in the evenings as a play area to drink etc. In answer to the question I don’t think a stroll through is disrespectful at all.

No it's fine.
They're lovely places to walk.

When I was at high school there was a trend for huge groups of teens to get drunk in the graveyard.. I never attended myself as I found it horrifically creepy, and I was never really cool enough to be properly invited anyway.

Gosh, I haven’t thought about Arnos Vale for years. I’m a Bristolian who moved away 40 years ago.

Not at all

Is it Sheffield General Cemetery? That's a gorgeous cemetery near me and matches your description. 🙂

Not really sure why running on a footpath through a cemetery is any more disrespectful than walking a dog or eating a packed lunch.
On the very few occasions when I've been in my local cemetery and there have been burials taking place, I have walked in the other direction.
as long as you aren't walking on graves or using tombs as a picnic table, I think it's fine.

@AreWeNearlyHairnet

Nope

This is turning into guess the cemetery

Why is it more disrespectful to jog through a cemetery than to walk through it?

I am in Ireland so not sure if it is different but people here walk the cemetery all the time. My mother loves a good cemetery and can spend hours looking at the graves. Im not a fan myself although I was at a restaurant recently in another county and had dinner in a renovated church which is actually on a graveyard and we went for a stroll around the graves after dinner.

Blimey me too, moved away 25 years ago and Arnos Vale is a blast from the past.

Waves to Matilda and to the rest of the Bristol diaspora 👋.

I love walking around cemetaries and often read the gravestones and wonder about people’s lives. I find them very peaceful.

We used to live near to a massive cemetery in london. A small group of us would meet to walk our dogs there. It was quite fascinating as some parts were really old and overgrown, clearly no one went there to “visit” at all, while other parts were very well manicured, and some incredibly grand mausoleums. We were always careful to walk on paths, it really was a beautiful and interesting place to stroll around.

I find it fascinating reading the headstones at the cemetery where my parents are buried. Lots of dog walkers too. As long as people are respectful (and not on their bloody phone constantly like a woman was the other week), it's peaceful.
My mum died when my daughter was a very young baby and I used to buy a sandwich and a drink and sit on a bench near her grave whilst DD slept. Just sat there reminiscing etc. I clearly don't get out much! 😂

As long as you keep your dog on a lead, and don't let it crap in the graveyard, can't see a problem.

Not disrespectful at all.

One of my ancestors is buried in Highgate Cemetary, along the row from the resting place of Karl Marx. They get a lot of visitors.

No, I live beside a big cemetery with very old and very new burials and I walk the dog and my daughter there a lot. We don't walk through the in-use part with recent burial though.

I'll be honest, I don't think it's fine with a dog. Fine if it's just you having a peaceful stroll and quiet contemplation time, but even a dog on a lead is likely to relieve itself somewhere near a gravestone.

There's a local graveyard that is just beautiful and I used to walk through it most days. Mostly walking the dog as the park was on the other side but I always took the long route through the graveyard as it's beautiful and so peaceful.
Many other locals do the same.
I think it's nice to think about the people that came before us and quietly pay your respects as you go.

In feudal times our burials grounds (churchyards) were our first public green spaces, there have been laws banning cock fighting, football etc over time which suggests that they were well used places (individual grave markers weren't common until the 1700s). Our Victorian Cemeteries were laid out with the intention that we would spend time in them, specimen trees, nice vistas etc. It took town planners some time to work out that yiu could have public green space without the burials!

There's a brilliant conservation charity called Caring for God's Acre that supports burial ground managers and communities to manage all types of burial grounds for biodiversity and heritage with lots of resources including children's activities for enjoying and looking after burial grounds.

www.caringforgodsacre.org.uk

If, like me, you are into social history and wildlife their website is worth a look.

Waves back. 👋 Did you find yourself saying it in a strong Bristolian accent? 😂

Not in the slightest. They are very peaceful places.

(Aarghhh) - 'cemetery'.

Oh for an edit button.

Definitely not - we went on a paid tour of a cemetery in New Orleans. Was really interesting to understand the history of the place and people.

I love cemeteries and go into any I see. Was walking in one of our local ones and a person had been lying down and sat up. I nearly shat myself !

Same in Scotland, used to eat lunch in one on a sunny day as it was directly in the centre of town - v v old graves and always crammed full of people eating lunch/sitting in the sun !!