Daniela Henao and her partner Sebastián Gutiérrez smiled as they walked under the historic sign that welcomed them into the Fort Worth Stockyards.
The couple from Colombia were immediately in awe of the Western stores and historic buildings along both sides of East Exchange Avenue. After all, they had stepped through a portal that transported them to the Old West for the first time.
“Everything looks like a movie, literally,” Henao said in Spanish. “I feel like a cowgirl here.”
Henao and Gutiérrez are among the many international tourists who have made their way to Cowtown in the past month during the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
The soccer tournament was expected to draw millions to North Texas before the first of nine Arlington matches — the most of any host city — kicked off. Only the July 14 semifinal match at Dallas Stadium remains to be played, with the final two teams to be determined.
Fort Worth has geared up efforts to draw international attention to its Western heritage through citywide “Howdy World” branding visible throughout the Stockyards and in other key cultural areas.
The Stockyards has welcomed 1,563,806 visitors in the past 30 days, according to numbers provided on Tuesday by the Stockyards Heritage Development Co. The historic area saw 974,200 visitors during the same time period last year.
Ethan Cartwright, senior vice president of marketing for Stockyards Heritage Development, said that hearing a dozen distinct languages alongside the clip-clop of the daily city herd cattle drive down Exchange Avenue proves that while the world has gotten bigger, “the spirit of this place remains exactly the same.”
“Long before stadiums and global broadcasts, this area was defined by the Chisholm Trail, a place where paths crossed and people from all walks of life found common ground,” he said in a statement. “Seeing international sports fans fill the historic Stockyards feels like the natural continuation of that story.”
During Henao’s recent visit to the Stockyards, she and her family spent the remainder of their afternoon savoring barbecue and watching the longhorn cattle parade to “live the full experience.” They planned to travel to Dallas the following day.
Nearby, Karoline Machago posed for selfies and recorded videos of the Western scenes outside Stockyards Station. The tourist, originally from Brazil but now living in Boston, was on her first visit to Fort Worth.
During her one-day trip, she watched the rodeo at Cowtown Coliseum before enjoying brisket smothered in barbecue sauce. The trip cheered her up after Brazil’s loss to Norway on Sunday in New Jersey, she said.
“I’m loving it here, so excited, so cool,” she said. “It’s so different from what I was seeing in Boston.”
A few feet away, Frank Wang sat on the patio at Riscky’s Trailboss Burgers as he and his family waited to order. Wang, who traveled from Singapore, had previously visited the East and West coasts, but this was his first venture to the middle part of the U.S.
“Texas, in our opinion, it’s desert and hot,” he said.
Wang had only been in North Texas for three days, but he had already fallen in love with the cultural spirit Americans have, especially when dressing up in red, white and blue for the World Cup.
“They dress themselves up on the face,” he said in reference to face paint. “That makes a very deep impression.”
David Moreno is the arts and culture reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at david.moreno@fortworthreport.org or @davidmreports.
The Fort Worth Report’s arts and culture coverage is supported in part by the Meta Alice Keith Bratten Foundation and the Virginia Hobbs Charitable Trust. At the Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
