We’re going to try something new here; on Sundays, instead of taking your computer or phone out to a field or lake and letting it run and swim free, what if we used those machines to let all of us Autopians talk and discuss things and get to know one another even better! Let crushes form, rivalries grow, grudges fester, facts learned, opinions proffered, mockeries attempted, all that. Who’s up to try? You are! So, here we go with our first prompt to get everyone talking: What’s the most amazing car you only saw one time, by chance?
I think for me it’d be a Facel-Vega, a Chrysler V8-powered elegant French beast I once saw street parked in West LA as I was driving by. Who is street parking and driving around a Facel-Vega? It’s like using a golden chariot pulled by winged horses as a septic tank cleaning vehicle. It’s too good for the real world, yet there it was, parked behind some beige Corolla with a mismatched door and by a driveway to a Jack In The Box.
So, what was your amazing, unexpected, chance car sighting? Tell me! I’m so very nosy!
I probably saw several when visiting Western Europe twice decades ago. I only specifically remember seeing a Lotus Europa somewhere and that’s because it was my favorite Matchbox car. However, that isn’t the rarest one as I also saw one in the LA/OC area in the same time span.
No, the rarest car I’ve only seen once was a blue Cadillac CTS-V wagon about 10 years ago.
Bright red and impossibly beautiful 1962 Ferrari California Spyder driving on the snow and ice covered roads of Norman, Oklahoma back in the winter of ’83. I was torn between my joy at seeing one of these in person and my absolute rage that someone would take a piece of automotive artwork like this out on the roads in that kind of weather.
I didn’t know what it was at the time, but it was an impossibly graceful upright coupe looking a little forlorn in dark grey. My brain took copious notes and I later figured out that this sleek but shabby car was a Maserati 3500GT.
I still don’t know what the heck it was, maybe a mirage. Parked on the street in Southampton village at dusk (yes a town where you see many rare and amazing vehicles!), what appeared to be some sort of maybe Corvette C2 era prototype, but it had a mid-mounted engine with a glass cover on it. Absolutely sick looking, and I didn’t have a camera handy! I have googled prototype Vettes and did not find an exact match..anyone have ideas?
Was it bright yellow? There used to be an AMX III in the area.
A bit late to the party, but I’ve got a few;
– 2009 Bristol Blenheim 4s, spotted parked behind a shopping center in Leeds (UK), the only one they made.
– 1930 Aston Martin international (?) 1.5l; pulled up while on holiday in a small village in Wales
– Aston martin DB5, ripping past London kings cross station
– Borgward Isabella cabriolet, on the motorway somewhere around Liverpool
When I was a teenager in the late 1980’s, I saw a Lamborghini drive by. Not a Countach, a Jalpa. A bright yellow one cruised by me. As a car obsessed teen , I was flabbergasted.
Now objectively I have have no idea then or now how these actually drove. But to then to see one in the same zip code as my decidedly middle class neighborhood was a revelation.
Morgan AeroMax (1 of 100) spotted in Melbourne, Australia (must have been privately imported) – absolutely amazing engine noise, pure sex.
Immaculate Aston Martin DB5 in silver parked nonchalantly on the street in Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds, UK. So effortless, so 007, so classy.
I saw Truckla while out walking my dog. I was going to snap a picture on the return trip, but by then, Truckla was gone.
She is one of my daughter’s favorite YouTubers and part of the reason she wants to be an engineer. I would have camped out and waited for an autograph and photo op.
My gob was well and truly smacked to find a blower Bentley (in BRG, of course) parked at the shops in a small seaside town in rural Victoria (Australia), many years ago. Driven by an older chap, who was probably using it to pick up milk and the papers on a Saturday morning.
Aston Martin Lagonda, in Soho NYC.
The white one? Haven’t seen it in over a decade.