Car Lust

The Natchez Trace Parkway at Highway 96 West

Just southwest of Nashville, Tennessee, lies the Northern Terminus of the Natchez Trace Parkway. And about 8.7 miles down the Trace, where it crosses Highway 96 West, sits this amazing structure. This intersection also happens to be the first exit after you enter the 444-mile-long Parkway.

Here we are looking East toward Franklin, Tennessee; Google Maps shows a nice picture of it. And as one indication of the magnificent scenery here, the view from the bridge won me a Car and Driver "10 Best Straightaways Contest Winner" sweatshirt and some ink in the January, 2000 issue.

Great Cars of Russia

Alex spent a week in Russia on a school trip and took a lot of pictures, including quite a few of the local four-wheeled fauna. Here's some of what he saw:

Carspotters' Challenge #57--Maybe Diamonds Are Forever, But Police Cars Sure Aren't

There's a great car chase scene in James Bond's "Diamonds Are Forever" that was filmed in downtown Las Vegas. I've seen this whimsical pursuit at least 50 times, and still get a kick out of it every time.

In this chase, our favorite double naught spy, along with the lovely Miss Tiffany Case, are being pursued by Sin City's finest. Among other treats, this chase introduces moviegoers to the right way (and the wrong way) of driving a car on two wheels. There's also some great smash-'em-up scenes, yet nobody gets hurt.

Here's a frame from the 1971 feature during the wild pursuit. The blue & white police car is a bit out of focus, but there's plenty of other vintage sheet metal that can be identified:

Some Cars Just Should NOT Have 4 Doors

"You're travelling through another dimension. A dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. At the signpost up ahead, your next stop... the twilight zone." --Rod Serling

Yes, folks, some cars just should not be 4-doors. A lot of folks felt this way when the Dodge Charger was reintroduced in the 2006 model year, but we did get used to it. For the most part. I know the cops sure did.

And usually, if a car has a back seat, I'd like back doors there. I learned my lesson in a 2-door Chevette about leaning forward to let folks in the back.

But there are some cars that no amount of time will ever pass to let them be. They are surely from, or should go to, the twilight zone.

Carspotters' Challenge #56--Sunset Strip, 1979

Swimmin' pools, movie stars... and great '70s vintage cars! Why, Cecil B. DeVille himself couldn't have assembled a better cast of Car Lust Delectables for this week's Carspotters' Challenge.

Our occasional contributor Tigerstrypes found this beauty shot. And if I may, I'd like to suggest that we all click here to get the best resolution of the image, sweetheart. That's better than sunglasses; there's no need to squint while you're in Tinsel Town. ("Look, is that John Belushi I see over there? Hey, John!")

1972-1976 Volkswagen SP2

While searching images for the Buick Centurion / LeSabre post, I stumbled on this car by accident. I had never heard of an SP2... and now I'd love to have one.

But I'd probably have a better chance of going to Mars than getting one. Only 670 of them left their home in Brazil, and none of them ever came to the United States as new cars.

That racy bodywork included a rear-mounted engine under a hatchback lift gate. Not an easy trick to design, I'm sure. And it's got to be safe... look at all that front crush space. The only styling reservation I might have is that I think a little more time should have been spent on the grille-less front end... though it does grow on one after a while. And just imagine some rallye or fog lights there.

An SP2 is stunning to look at, even 40+ years later. The long hood/short trunklid styling screams Italiano! As well it should, since the SP2's designers included Jose Vicente Martins, Jorge Oba, and Marcio Piancastelli, who studied under the great Luigi Segre at Carrozzeria Ghia. Its cabin appointments were also first class for the time, and the rear engine area shows engineering packaging of sheer genius.

April 22 Weekly Open Thread: The "New Car" Blues

Our recent $100,000 Fantasy Garage Challenge has inspired me to seek out and find a new vehicle. I won't say the brand so that nobody gets offended or sued, but I will say that so far, the experience has been a borderline nightmare.

On my first visit to the dealer, they said they can't discount any new ones at all. Then I got on the internet, and saw that they are advertising a $1,500 discount or more on all of them (after a "Dealer Fee" of $598 is added).

Now I'm getting the usual runarounds... "There's no markup to work with," and "It's the time of the year where everybody wants one."

There was the perennial favorite, "There aren't any incentives on them right now." Then I got hammered with, "What are you going to trade in?" (I never trade.) Also, "Who do you have your financing with?" (It's a cash deal, folks.) Seems they're exploring every other opportunity to stick me as well. At this point, I'm seriously thinking about forgetting the whole thing.

But the biggest "pisser" has been when I have twice placed a vehicle request all over the Middle Tennessee region, and the local dealer sees it. They saw the requests and quickly called me back to say, "You won't get a better deal than we will give you," and, "You need to come back in so we can toss some numbers around."

Car Lust, Tom Clancy Style: the Cars of "The Americans"

Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings and their two children may look like your typical middle-class family from the Washington suburbs, but they're anything but. Phillip (Matthew Rhys) and Elizabeth (Keri Russell) are Soviet sleeper agents assigned to infiltrate the US government, Russians who were trained and drilled for years to look, sound, and act American. Their true identities kept secret from their own children, they lead a complex and dangerous double life, torn between their loyalty to (and fear of) their employer, their love for their kids and each other, and their growing realization that they might be working for the wrong cause.

My son and I have become hooked on The Americans, a new spy drama series that is set in the year 1981. The newly-installed Reagan administration is taking a confrontational stance toward the USSR, and the KGB is desperate for information on a rumored missile defense system that would render the mighty Soviet nuclear arsenal impotent. Moscow is pushing Phillip and Elizabeth into ever more dangerous situations, while showing no tolerance for failure--and if that wasn't trouble enough, their friendly new neighbor Stan (Noah Emmerich) is an FBI agent assigned to the Counterintelligence Division, working to identify and apprehend deep-cover Soviet agents!

What do I like about the show? There are a lot of things to like--the protagonists are complex and realistic characters, the "tradecraft" they use is very authentic, the show never forgets who the bad guys are--but as one who was there in 1981, I appreciate the attention to period detail--including, most particularly, the very Car Lust selection of vehicles on display.

Battle of the 1970s Super Cars!

Submitted for your consideration, this delightful bit of animated Car Lust:

1971-1973 Buick Centurion vs. 1971-1973 Buick LeSabre

"Uh-LLLLadies... and... Gen-tle-men! On the left, weighing 4,329 lbs. and standing 54 inches in height with a wheelbase of 124 inches, we have the 1973 Buick Centurion. And on the right, also weighing 4,329 lbs. and standing 54 inches and with a wheelbase of 124 inches, we have the 1973 Buick LeSabre."

"So, from the Car Lust home office here in the great United States of America..."

"... Uh-Let's get ready to rum-bullllllll!"

Quite a while back in a discussion here at Car Lust, we swapped stories comparing the similarities and differences of Buick's Wildcat/Centurion vs. their LeSabre. If memory serves, the outcome more or less stated that the Wildcat/Centurion was Buick's "sporty" full-sized car while the LeSabre was the more practical one. Of course, the Electra 225, Buick's flagship luxury model, had enough differences to not be included in the discussion.