Renting a JDM Legend Is the Best Way to See Japan

Rental car roulette. We’ve all been there. Book a certain category of car, with a vague promise it’ll be similar to something you’re actually familiar with, and hope that it isn’t too far removed from your expectations.

If all goes well, you might land something appropriate to the country you’re visiting. A Fiat 500 might be a bit miserable in the U.S., but few cars feel more perfect for whizzing around Italy. Sometimes, too, you can tip the odds in your favor: It’s pretty easy to get hold of something Mustang-shaped in California, for instance, while most rental companies offer “prestige” lines that will put you behind the wheel of a Mercedes or BMW.

Japan, however, can be a little tricky. Tall and boxy is the order of the day there, whatever class of car you’ve booked, and while you can guarantee the end result will be spotless, spacious, and simplicity itself to drive, it’ll be a distinctly thrill-free zone.

At least, that was the case until relatively recently. In the last decade or so, several companies have sprung up in Japan to give enthusiasts a taste of the best cars the country has to offer. And not just new cars, either, but some true JDM legends, from MX-5s to Skylines and beyond.

I learned of Omoshiro Rentacar (Omoren for short) around a year ago, in the early stages of planning a trip to Japan. I’d been searching for rental companies hiring out examples of the first-generation MX-5, or Eunos Roadster as it was known out there, and Omoren had one in their fleet—as did a company in Okinawa called 58Drive.

By the time I got around to booking my trip in the autumn, Omoren’s Eunos had been de-fleeted—older vehicles do wear out eventually, and I’d presumably just caught it at the wrong time. It was no great loss, however, as the company’s fleet also includes an example of just about every iconic Japanese performance car you can imagine, from modern offerings such as the Toyota GR86, GR Yaris, and the latest Nissan Z-car, to Imprezas, Supras, and even an R34-generation Nissan Skyline GT-R.

Naturally, you’ll pay for the privilege: Six hours with the R34 is currently 33,100 yen, or about $215 at current exchange rates. As I needed a car for a week, with plans to drive from Tokyo down to Osaka, with several steps in between, I set my sights a little lower. Omoshiro can help you there, too, with some of the most interesting versions of Japan’s tiny kei cars on its roster, including the Suzuki Jimny, the Honda S660 sports car, and the one I chose for my trip at just a fraction of the Skyline’s cost: the Suzuki Alto Works.

Somewhat boxy and upright, the Alto Works is a bit of a kei car legend. The first Works arrived in 1984, with a 543cc turbocharged three-cylinder engine, and there have been four generations since. Thanks to kei car manufacturers keeping power levels down, the Works has officially offered 64 hp for decades now, but with a lightweight body and in this car’s case, a manual gearbox, it sounded like a recipe for Fuji-sized amusement with Tamagotchi-style running costs.

Omoshiro is based in Noda, about an hour and a few trains north of central Tokyo. After clearing the paperwork (an easy enough process having booked beforehand, but remember to bring your International Driving Permit as you won’t be able to pick up the car without it) and checking over the car, I was good to go.

The Alto’s tiny size makes it a friendly and approachable thing over those first few miles through tight suburban streets—something that may not be the case with the luxurious Toyota Century, also in the firm’s fleet. First impressions were of a car with less sound insulation than coddled European small cars, allowing plenty of turbo flutter and three-cylinder burble into the cabin, a snappy short-throw gearshift paired with the world’s lightest clutch, and a decidedly firm ride offset slightly by fabulous Recaro seats.

Japan by Kei Car

Out onto Japan’s expressways—most of which are tolled, so make sure to tick the box for an ETC (Electronic Toll Collection) card on the rental form, too—the Alto is a busy companion. Fortunately, the country’s speed limits are low (almost always 80 km/h max, or around 50 mph, until you’re well outside urban areas, where the signs show up to 110 km/h, or 68 mph; most urban limits are 40 km/h, or 25 mph) so despite short gearing, revs aren’t too high unless you want them to be.

Another benefit of the low limits is a notably relaxing feel to covering distance. Everything does take a little longer—it always surprised me just how much I had left to go whenever I checked the satnav—but 80 km/h limits lend the expressways a chilled-out feel that would be alien to anyone in Europe or the U.S. The downside is that you spend more time mixing it with trucks, which can easily cruise at the same speeds. But with most traffic generally traveling within 5–10mph of each other, unlike the 40–90mph spread of U.K. motorways, it’s a blissful improvement and even had me wondering whether lower motorway limits may not be such a bad idea . . .

It’s on the smaller roads that the Alto comes into its own, though. Not just because it’s tiny—a regulation 58 inches wide, around eight inches narrower even than the Fiat 500e, one of the smallest modern cars on U.S. roads—but also because at lower speeds, the bicycle-style gear ratios, revvy turbo engine, and stiff suspension give it an energetic feel that slaps a smile on your face just about everywhere.

It’s game for a laugh the moment the mood takes you but will also perfectly play the role of sensible city car, with good visibility, doors you can open in the tightest of spaces, and a sense you’re not using unnecessary quantities of energy or taking up undue space on the road while you go about your business.

The little Alto took me down from Tokyo to the picturesque town of Hakone in the shadow of Mount Fuji, where it turned into a grippy little terrier of a car, perfectly sized for the tight hairpins of the local roads. From there we buzzed down to Nagoya and then Osaka, and after that, a trip into the mountains toward Takayama. Here, despite my best efforts to avoid it, we encountered snow. Japan’s diligence in clearing secondary routes was welcome, as the Suzuki was running sticky summer rubber, the exact opposite of what you want for slippery roads. Even when things turned into a scene from a snow globe, though, the tiny 165-section tires cut down to the tarmac where a European hot hatch on fat 225s would start to skate.

Fretting that conditions would be even worse the next morning, I set off early to give myself time to get back to Tokyo—around five hours from Takayama—before the drop-off time. I needn’t have worried though, as despite similar road conditions to the day before (a few exploratory squeezes of the brake to find the ABS activation helped me keep to appropriate speeds on some rollercoaster downhill runs), the roads began to dry out as the elevation decreased. It was a clean expressway run all the way back to the city.

In truth, I’d used the Alto as a bit of a workhorse, covering around 800 miles in seven days (with an average economy of around 65mpg being another benefit of Japan’s low speeds). If I’d missed out on some proper Tokyo night cruising or winding touge, I still had one more chance to rectify that—as I’d also booked 24 hours with Omoshiro’s second-generation, turbocharged Toyota MR2 GT-S.

Mid-Engined Masterpiece

This was the car I was really looking forward to on the trip. Not just because I’d never driven a second-gen MR2, but also because it felt like a true Gran Turismo and Best Motoring icon—perhaps not one of the all-time JDM legends, but a fantastic performance car that is still mostly within the reach of normal folk rather than collectors.

Omoshiro’s white car has clearly lived a life, with more than 281,000 km on the odometer (around 174,000 miles) and a few suspicious clunks and clonks over rougher surfaces. But if the Alto was calming because of Japan’s low speed limits, the MR2 just felt like home. There’s a sense of wellbeing I get from these 1990s Japanese cars that I’ve just not experienced from any other car, even from the same era. Maybe it’s the soft feel of the fabric seats, the smell of the plastics, the robust but tactile feel to the controls, or the unique resonances to the drivetrain and body, but within a few miles it felt like I’d spent a decade with it already.

And over the next 24 hours, I probably spent a good 12 of them sitting ahead of the MR2’s 242-hp turbocharged four-cylinder. I looped around Tokyo’s center, stopping off at Type One, the legendary Honda tuning shop, and then the famous Daikoku and Tatsumi parking areas, where Tokyo’s petrolheads gather nearly every night of the week. After I was sure the shopping crowds had disappeared, I then made my way into Roppongi and then Akihabara, grabbing photos of the Toyota under the city’s vibrant lights.

Up early the following day, it was back on the expressway to the best driving roads I could find within sensible reach of the city. I kept the pace down, temptation tempered by the contracts I’d signed promising hefty bills if I put Omoshiro’s precious car into the Armco, and also by the traffic-calming measures Japan has implemented on many of the roads beloved by the street racing and drifting scenes.

But it was still enough to get a proper taste of the MR2, its ample performance, and its keen mid-engined balance—on the roads it was designed to excel on. I’ve never quite beaten the nagging feeling that some of my favorite performance cars are wasted on U.K. roads, with their severe cambers, potholes, and cloying traffic. A blissful few hours on a virtually empty mountain pass in Japan confirmed it. A drive like that, once a year, surrounded by incredible autumn colors, is worth 50 frustrated ventures onto the lanes of Bedfordshire, or venturing hours to quarrel with sheep and caravans in Wales.

With the car returned in one piece, albeit smelling just a little more of unburned super unleaded and hot brakes than it had 24 hours earlier, I’d already made up my mind that I’ll be returning to Omoshiro on my next trip to Japan to try out even more of its amazing selection of cars.

Options and Pricing

You need not limit yourself to just one company, of course. As well as Omoshiro, there’s the aforementioned 58Drive in Okinawa if you want to take a classic soft-top around Japan, while Fun2Drive is another hugely popular rental company with more tailored experiences. Based near Fuji and within easy reach of dozens of incredible driving roads, Fun2Drive’s fleet includes legendary classics like the “hakosuka” and “kenmeri” Nissan Skylines, each in GT-R replica form, as well as an AE86 Corolla as made famous by the Initial D manga, and a first-generation NSX.

Pricing varies among the different firms. The Alto was, for me, an absolute bargain, at only $76 for the first 24 hours and just over $50 per day thereafter—almost certainly less than it’d have cost me for a traditional rental at an airport desk. A day with the MR2 was just over $101 (actual costs were higher—with both cars there’s ETC card rental and insurance waivers to factor into the final price). Some of the higher-performance cars are a lot more, but still reasonable for the time periods offered.

With Fun2Drive, that iconic AE86 will set you back upwards of $215, and that’s for guided tours, but this does reflect the rarity and value of some of the vehicles. Hiring 58Drive’s pretty yellow Eunos Roadster for two days and one night, enough to get under its skin, is 22,000 yen at the moment, or just over $140 at current exchange rates. Again, pretty reasonable for the experience.

If you ever visit Japan and want to see the country through the windscreen of something just a little more special, forget the usual rental firms, and get behind the wheel of a JDM legend instead. Even a tiny one like the Suzuki Alto Works will give you a different perspective on what makes Japan, and its performance cars, so wonderful.