When I was growing up our family was friends with a family who owned and ran a guest ranch up the river from our place. Each summer they welcomed dudes, primarily from back east, who wanted to taste a bit of ranch life. They keep a small herd of horses that were well broken and gentle and maintained summer cabins with motel-like amenities, and often hired a few local teens to assist with cleaning, food preparation, serving, and working the stock. The guests didn’t really accomplish much ranch work. In fact the operation was run by two brothers one of whom focused on running the ranch, and another who focused on guests and services. Theirs was just one of several ranches that supplemented their income with guest services. Our town was not far from Yellowstone National Park and each summer we had a steady stream of people staying in our town who were heading to or from the park.

Things have changed in that place. I think there are still a couple of operational guest ranches in the valley, but most of the working ranches are now owned by people who don’t live on them, but who use them as private vacation properties. People who live in my home town still welcome guests, but many of them are part-time residents who own multiple homes.

Living in South Dakota taught me a lot more about welcoming guests. Rapid City, where we lived, grew quite a bit during the 25 years we lived there from just over 60,000 to over 75,000 people. The Black Hills, however, is in many ways a spread-out urban area with a total population of nearly 250,000. If you count people that way, it rivals the state’s largest city, Sioux Falls, on the other end of the state. But everyone in the Black Hills knows that the first full week of August, including weekends at both ends, is the annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally with an average attendance of 500,000. You learn a lot about welcoming guests when you live in a place where the population doubles during a single week each summer. You learn to be a careful driver when half of the traffic is motorcycles.

I’m predicting that some of the things I learned about welcoming guests and patience with sudden influxes of traffic will come in handy a year and a half from now when the Pacific Northwest will host the men’s FIFA World Cup. Soccer is the world’s most popular sport and there will be 13 World Cup matches split between Seattle and Vancouver spread over a four-week span. It is part of a much larger tournament with 48 national teams playing in a total of 16 cities across the USA, Canada, and Mexico. Based on previous FIFA World Cup events, the host committee is estimating that 750,000 people will be coming to our area. World Cup matches draw crowds far larger than the capacity of the stadiums where the matches are played. People want to be part of the overall excitement of the globe’s most watched sporting event. Host event planners estimate that only about half of the people who will come to our area will succeed in securing tickets to sit in the stadiums during matches. The rest will come to be a part of the general excitement and to rub elbows with the fans who do have tickets.

Like the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, when the fans come to town there will be too many to stay in any one city and the impact will be regional. And our little area is between the two big cities. We’re under 50 miles from the Vancouver stadium where the games will be held. I’m sure that the customs and border patrol people will ramp up staffing at the crossing and that all lanes will be open. Still, it is possible that the lines of tourists traveling back and forth across the border could stretch for miles and clog the streets of Blaine.

Of course, like the Sturgis Rally, local tourism officials are seeking to put on our best for the fans, hoping that some of them will want to return later to take a closer look at all that our area has to offer. And there is a lot that we have to offer with the Salish Sea, the mountains, and the wonderfully temperate weather.

We’ve had a few opportunities to practice for the influx of tourists and lines of people crossing the border. Last Summer the Toronto Blue Jays came to Seattle for a series with the Seattle Mariners the same weekend as Taylor Swift played two concerts there as well. There were so many people trying to cross at the border that some waited as long as 3 hours in lines of cars that stretched for miles.

Locals who have lived here longer than we have remember 2010 when Vancouver hosted the Winter Olympics. Both Canada and the US opened extra lanes at the border and increased staffing to handle the large number of people who were staying on our side of the border and commuting to the Olympics. Like the World Cup, the Olympics draws crowds beyond those who hold event tickets.

Based on those experiences, event planners are hoping for an increase in bus services and perhaps a significant increase in cross-border Amtrak service. There also have been some improvements in advance screening of border crosses that could reduce delays at the border.

I’m thinking that there will be a few vendors with ice cream trucks and mobile espresso cafes who are already planning the perfect places to park their vehicles in order to take advantage of those waiting in line. I’m rooting for the entrepreneurial children who might find the right place for the perfect lemonade stand.

When we lived in South Dakota we learned to sometimes take part of our vacation during the Rally. It isn’t that we don’t like to welcome guests, but we aren’t much for lines and crowds. I can’t predict what the future holds, but I am considering a big trip for the summer of 2026. It might just be a good time to head to some place with fewer people.