TRAVEL 67 : Chris Willson Photography

First some background…

Although I learned to drive when I was 17, I didn’t have my own car. I would pootle around in my mother’s Rover Metro. It  got my climbing buddies, Stewart and Jack, and me out to places like Stanage Edge and the Lake District on weekends. It did exactly what my dad said a car should do – get you from A to B.

At university and for several years after I never owned a car. It wasn’t until 2001, a couple of years after moving to Japan I got my very first vehicle.

My 1987 Toyota Hilux Surf

For 70,000 yen (US$ 700) I got my very own monster truck.  The Toyota Hilux Surf as demonstrated on Top Gear is usually one of the toughest vehicles on the road. My aging Surf, however,  was on its last legs, the old turbo diesel engine would whine as it slowly built up momentum to it’s top speed of 80 kilometers an hour. The limited speed was however a bonus as the worn breaks, knobbly tyres and spongy suspension meant that the only thing it did slower than accelerate was decelerate. During the 7 months I owned the beast my dive buddy Hiroshi and I went to nearly every dive spot on the island. Sure the exhaust fell off twice, I had to jump start it more often that not, and it once tried to throw itself off a cliff, but every drive was an unforgettable experience. 

After 9 months of being without a car in Hokkaido I returned to Okinawa and found myself a new ride. For the princely sum of 150,000 yen (US $1500) I got myself possibly the greatest sports car in the world.

My 1989 Eunos Roadster ( Mazda MX-5)

Already 13 years old, and with nearly 90,000 kilometers on the clock, the little silver roadster was sitting outside an Okinawan junkyard. Over the last six and a half years we have travelled about 80,000 kilometers, cruising Okinawa’s coastal roads and expressway, and enjoying  fantastic late night, top down, blasts back up the 58 after watching a movie in Chatan. (The car doesn’t get to see the movie, but waits patiently in the parking lot.)

Now twenty years old, the car is a little worse for wear. Similar to a worn and disheveled teddy bear it has clearly been well loved. The air-con died a couple of summers ago, the steering wheel is disintegrating, the paint is flaking, the canvas top is no longer waterproof and the electrical system is somewhat unreliable.  These however are minor ailments I have been able to live with. Recently, there has been a more serious problem, white smoke when I accelerate hard.

This month my shaken is due. Shaken is the car inspection (similar to a M.O.T. in the UK ) that must be done every two years. It is comprehensive and expensive. The reason why used cars in Japan are so cheap is that shaken are so expensive.  The last three shaken for my roadster came to around 150,000 each time (the same as the original cost of the car). A couple of days ago the local  Mazda mechanic took a look at my car and gave me the bad news – it would need an engine rebuild, a  new alternator, new tires and that was before the shaken began. I would be looking at around 250,000 yen to keep it on the road, and something else might, and probably would, go wrong not long after. Plus I would be facing another Okinawan summer with no air-con.  The Mazda mechanic pretty much said, it’s time to say goodbye.

So for the next couple of weeks I am both looking for a new car and savoring the last few drives in my old one. Hopefully we will get all the way up to Cape Hedo on a sunny day, but all too soon it will have to disappear, perhaps in a cloud of its own white smoke.