Christopher S Cain, standing on the ever so famous wall of Minami Circuit, Ebisu. You might’n recognise the name, but I’m sure your familiar with his blog, Beeoneoneoh. He put a photo up of Dino Dalle Carbonare and myself a few days ago, so I thought I’d return the favour. Chris mentioned photographers by nature generally don’t have many images of themselves, well whilst doing what they love doing, taking photos. I have to agree and I’m thrilled I have a shot of Chris at Ebisu otherwise I’d feel a little guilty.

Crossing paths with the ever so famous Wonder was completely unexpected.  Our last day in Shinjuku motivated us even more to explore around the city area before we headed to Daikoku PA later that evening.

The previous night, well I should say morning was a late one. After Daikoku PA we managed to get invited to a drifting meet at the docks of Yokohama Bay. As a result of this we were back in Shinjuku asleep at about 4:00AM. We had all agreed to get some rest that morning as it was our last day in Tokyo before beginning the journey up north to Tsukuba and Nihonmatsu for the D1-SL series and Matsuri. Waking up just after lunch time we lazed around the hotel for a couple of hours gathering our belongings and packing the tiny hire-cars to the absolute brim, by this time our stomachs were calling!

Driving straight into the city on the search for a noodle bar Nigel managed to spot Manabu Mitsumori-sans JXZ100 parked out the front of Wonder. At the time Nigel mumbled a few words unbelievably fast and twitched… Somehow I understood what came out of his mouth so I immediately went crazy in the back seat and we pulled into the next street.

Jumping out of the car, grabbing my camera I sprinted a couple of hundred metres back up the main road and saw this… A kouki S14 slammed on Origin DNA-02 wheels and a pair of R33 GT-R’s on the rear. The parks out the front of the workshop were filled with customers cars…

…Another customers car being this white C33 Nissan Laurel. In all honesty I can’t explain how much I fell in love with this car in person, this styling just screams out 80’s/90’s, I’ve always LOVED 15’s on larger cars. The C33 is powered by a RB25DE which is described as a Kaido Racer by Manabu-san.

I love it how the rear of the bonnet has been raised. Check out the 15″ SSR mesh.

I didn’t manage to get a photo of the back of the Laurel, but I noticed I had a video of the car and grabbed this screen shot. Take note of the exhaust. I wish I got to hear this thing.

And finally the Team Spirant AE86 driven by Manabu Misumori-san.

I am really looking forward to Spring Matsuri this year. I’ve been speaking with Manabu-san and by the sounds of things he will be driving the hachi-roku at this years Spring Matsuri in April along with a small group of drivers!

Casey.

As I’m listening to Japanese hip-hop i’m finding it extremely hard to believe the 3 week trip to Japan has unfortunately come to an end.

Over the 3 week period, the amount of driving, cars, workshops and sights we saw was truly spectacular, we wouldn’t of had it any other way. Each day of the trip became the best day of my life, the amount of cars we saw was sometimes too much. Experiencing such events and witnessing such cars in real life is really overwhelming especially when you’ve been dreaming of seeing for years and years. Plenty of photos to come guys!

I plan on going back as soon as possible. That place has definitely left it’s mark on me.

Casey.