Tip: If you want to get up-close-and-personal with race vehicles, hang out at the local gas station on the rest day. It seems that many teams drive from the bivouac to the local gas station to fill up then

It’s highly probably that you’ll find a racer at the gas station--Dakar first-timer Chris Birch shown here--to get their autograph from or pose for a picture with

If you prefer two-wheeled ground transportation to various spectator points in the Atacama, the longer Desafio del Desierto tours include a bike rental fee.

We spent much of the race’s rest day sight-seeing, stopping at several beaches not that far from the bivouac. The pretty round things are jellyfish, which this particular beach had an abundance of.

Another place we visited while sight-seeing was the San Jose mine. That’s where the 33 miners were trapped for 69 days before all were rescued.

For lunch while sight-seeing, we stopped at a great seaside restaurant that featured awesome seafood. Come to think of it, there were no bad meals in Chile.

Dakar made the big trucks famous and they remain a crowd favorite. If you’ve ever dreamed of seeing them in person, the Desafio del Desierto Dakar tour now makes that a possibility with a bite-sized portion of the race that takes only a long weekend of your time.