[William Cloud Hicklin]

Elves and Men had drifted apart in the three millennia since the Last Alliance. The Elves kept to themselves and thought it best that mortals and immortals not mingle (save in the house of the half-Elf Elrond); and Lorien in particular valued armed secrecy, a latter-day Doriath. Not that other Elves were much more outgoing; the behavior of the Wood-elves in The Hobbit would have been normal, not something specially cooked up for Thorin & Co. While the interests of commerce did generate contact (the raft-Elves' trade with Lake-town), note that the Elves visited Esgaroth but not, apparently, vice-versa; Men were not welcome within Thranduil's borders.

And Men, naturally, were suspicious of that which they did not understand and thought alien, hence the superstitious dread exhibited by the Rohirrim. Men of Gondor, or at least the upper classes, would not have been so narrow-minded; but it's clear from Boromir's dream/mission and Denethor's advice that neither knew anything even of Rivendell save as a legendary Shangri-la somewhere in the North. It's fair to say that their attitude would have been one of superstitious awe rather than superstitious dread.