Hunter all Japanese Car Show

16 August 2023 / Written: Chris Cameron, Photos: John Purcell

Our 5 squeaky-clean MX5’s rolled into McDonald Jones stadium together early on a cold and damp morning in a long queue of Japanese car enthusiasts and were allocated a spot to line our cars up together – NA through ND and RF – in order of course. Our club flag proudly on display, we quickly found the coffee cart then took turns to go exploring and enjoy viewing the myriad of models on display. One oddity was the BMW parked just in front of us. Maybe the driver thinks BMW’s are made in Japan … There were also a lovely trio of Dart Copers (Aussie-made on a German goggomobil chassis), which were Aussie ingenuity. A little outside the brief, but all added to the wonderful display.

By 8:30am McDonald Jones carparks were packed with hundreds of cars and motorbikes. There was an amazing display of models, some of which took us back to our own early driving days when we owned or had a friend who had one.

It only drizzled lightly for a very short time, just enough to have to put our car roofs up temporarily, but it didn’t stop the hardy Newcastle crowds from walking around throughout the morning. Lots of people stopped to chat and ask about our cars, including a couple who had MX5’s on order and plan to join the club when they (eventually) arrive.

What I found really heartening was that a big proportion of the cars were owned by young people, excited to have a model of car they could tinker with and ‘fix up’ – just like we used to. And some of the cars really did need work, but no matter, the owners were just as proud to own them. There is a future for tinkering with cars that don’t need a laptop to analyze their black box!

Thank you to George & Jen Boyko for organising and to Les (NA), Ray (NB), John P (NC), Glenn (ND) and John E (RF) for coming along and preparing and presenting their beautiful cars.