DALLAS — The prediction of at least 1 million tourists traveling to Texas for the April 8th total solar eclipse has multiple Texas counties, including Ellis and Kaufman, issuing disaster declarations to activate every available resource to deal with the expected traffic.
The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is warning drivers not to stop on the side of highways and interstates and has banned wide-load truck traffic for that day.
And, an example of the potential population surge and the pull that the Great American Eclipse has on the entire world can be found in a small fishing village in the northernmost part of the country of Norway.
"The taste again of America, yeah, we just had to do it when the chance was there," said Yngve Kristiansen who, with his girlfriend May Antonsen, will be traveling to Texas from their home in Honningsvag, the northernmost city in mainland Norway in the North Cape at the 71st parallel in the Arctic Circle.
They live with spectacular views of the aurora borealis, but they have never seen a total eclipse. So, they decided, this is their chance—with a chance to see America and Texas, too.
"It's the leading country in the world, so it fascinates me on many levels," Kristiansen said of the United States. He has visited Florida and California before but has never been to Texas.
"Well, I expect to see, for my part, a lot of cowboy hats," he laughed when asked what Norwegians might expect to see in the Lone Star State. "A lot of SUVs with one person only driving," he joked, while admitting that Texas eclipse traffic is also a concern.
"I'm starting to worry more and more about that," he said.
Antonsen works as a pharmacist. Kristiansen works at a radar installation with the Norwegian Air Force where he says friends have also asked him the same question I posed during our Zoom interview.
"You already live in the Arctic Circle with several months of near-total darkness," I said. "Yet you are coming here to get four more minutes of darkness. Have you thought about it that way?"
"That's true," he said as both he and his girlfriend laughed. "Somebody at work joked with me about that thing. Yes, in fact, we are. We are really looking forward to it."
And, from his outpost at the northernmost point of land on the continent of Europe, he explained why they will travel halfway around the world to see Texas and a total eclipse for the very first time.
"Just to be there together with a lot of other people with the same interests," Kristiansen said. "It's also kind of a feeling of community who like to witness the wonders of the universe."
A celestial wonder that more than an estimated one million people believe is worth the trip and worth the traffic to be part of a once-in-a-lifetime event.
And Texas barbecue, that's on Yngve and May's to-do list, too.