How to measure a mile

The word mile comes from the latin 'mille'  meaning one thousand. orginating fron the Roman army.

 The standard pace by a Roman legionnaire was around 2 strides which roughly measured 5 feet. The soliders counted their paces to relieve boredom. So when he had counted and took 1050 strides he had marched roughly 5250 feet, which is not too far from the 5280 feet in a mile.

So when ever you need to measure a mile and have no equipment...try counting your strides.