You never know what you’ll come across while walking down the street here in Japan. This is  especially true for car enthusiasts. Here are a couple of nice examples I encountered this past weekend.

**2017 NOTE: I did a lot of car spotting when I lived in Japan. I hoped to make more of these posts featuring random finds here and there, but ended up just doing these at the time. Fun fact: The corolla owner actually caught up with me about an hour after shooting pics of his car to ask what I was doing. My less-than-amazing Japanese didn’t serve to clear things up very much.**

Up first is this mint Austin Cooper-S from the photo above. This is the sport version of the classic Mini Cooper. It has a 1.2L motor which, when combined with the lightweight mini, has plenty of go.

Back in the States, I rarely saw a classic mini on the roads. Here in Japan, they’re more common. Still, seeing one that’s in like new condition and an “S” model is a bit rare.

These were designed to maximize interior space while maintaining a compact overall package. The motor sends the power to the front wheels and the rear wheels are positioned all the way at the corners to minimize the loss of cabin space. Another design feature from factory is an uncomfortable driving position. The thought was that an uncomfortable driver is an alert driver.

Unfortunately, I found this next to a government building and, after catching the guard’s attention, decided it was best to leave before I could snap a photo of the whole car.

On to the next one:

From the corner of my eye, I noticed this little fella peaking out from behind a couple of cars.

I went to investigate and found this nice example of a 1970’s TE27 Corolla. “A 30 year old Corolla?” you ask? Yep, but it’s not just any 30 year old Corolla, this is the Corolla Levin that came with the bigger 1.6L motor and factory fender flares.

Nothing says awesome like fender mirrors, factory flares and staggered Watanabe wheels.

It does show some age, but with Japan’s insane summer humidity, you’d be hard pressed to find an older car like this around Japan in mint, original paint.

With its rear wheel drive layout and light weight, these were popular rally cars back in the day and have done well in most genres of auto racing over the years.

If you’re a car enthusiast, it doesn’t matter what kind of car or style you’re into, you’ll be surprised by what you can find rolling around on the streets or casually parked in a driveway or parking lot here in Japan. That is unless you’re into V8 muscle cars. If so, you’ll have to settle for something with an inline-6 or a big body sedan with a VH45 or a 1uz V8. Personally, I’d take a nicely boosted inline-6 over a V8 any day. So, it’s all good.