We all have that one car, the car we want more than any other out there. It isn’t perfect, not to everybody, but it is to us. To me that would be the first-generation Toyota 4Runner. Unimpressive? To some, yes. It’s not especially fast, rare or luxurious. But after years of searching listings, planning road trips and daydreaming through college classes, it became the car I wanted more than any other. And when I finally bought one in the closing weeks of 2024, it soon became anything but a “dream.”

In high school, I came across a listing for an affordable example of an old 4Runner. When I realized that a decent example could be had for under $10,000, it quickly became my attainable dream car.

But that was 2019, and the next year would become… well, if you were around and sentient at the time, you know. The year 2020 left me with a dilemma, everything was at a standstill. School was virtual, friends were digital and the ice rink (where I wanted to spend my time) was closed until further notice. The malaise of lockdown left me bored, frustrated, and with an abundance of free time. 

A great deal of that free time was spent on AutoTempest, filtering for Toyota 4Runners from 1984-1989, for sale all across North America. I would look at every listing I could find, and daydream about hitting the open road. I soon started spending a good bit of time researching different trails, roads and other sites I wanted to travel to, and I planned that, one day, I would have my own first-generation 4Runner, and I would travel to all of those places. 

With that, the original 4Runner went from my “obtainable dream car” to just my dream car. It was the car I wanted more than any other, and if given $1 million, I would go buy the nicest first-gen 4Runner I could find, and then use the leftover money for an Aston Martin, or a house or whatever.

It took quite some effort to save up a good bit of cash, working all throughout college and eventually having a comfortable enough budget to buy my dream 4Runner, not just looking this time. It only took 8 attempts. With a few auctions where I was outbid, and a few Facebook Marketplace finds, one of which was a rare 1987 turbo model. But at long last, on Christmas Eve 2024, I placed the winning bid of $7,700 for a 1986 Toyota 4Runner.

The example was red, with an automatic transmission and about 129,000 miles on it, low for a 40-year-old vehicle. After five years of saving, planning and daydreaming through college classes, I was finally about to own my dream car. I had to wait though, it was in Colorado, and would have to be shipped to me. 

Shipping was a nightmare, the first time it was supposed to be picked up, the seller wasn’t picking up his phone. I had been snowboarding, and waiting for the lifts to open back up after being shut down for high winds when I got a call from the driver, saying he couldn’t reach the seller. I also tried reaching the seller to no avail. Eventually the seller did get back to me, he had been on an a plane when the driver arrived, and had apparently left instructions on where the key was, but that information hadn’t been relayed to me or the driver for the shipping company.

Attempt number two saw the seller on a flight back to Colorado, and the driver did have the pickup instructions. But the driver was two hours late, and it was now dark and he didn’t want to walk down the dark rural driveway, nor could he get his truck and trailer there. Better still, when calling to remedy the issue, the driver called me thinking I was the seller. Safe to say it once again didn’t get picked up.

Then came trying to schedule a third pickup, which was taking a while to schedule, and my patience was thinning. I had to pester the Bring a Trailer shipping folks more than I would care to to finally get it scheduled, and finally, a month after I had won the auction, It finally arived. The delivery driver wasn’t going to be able to drop it off at my apartment, because his truck couldn’t maneuver in the small parking lot, so it was arranged to drop it off at the Little America Hotel, and I would drive it home from there. So on the scheduled day, I went to the Little America Hotel, and sat in the gas station restaurant area waiting to finally get my dream car. 

I had packed a bag with my cameras, planning on taking it for a drive to explore a bit, and find a place to take some scenic pictures of my new (to me) 4Runner. The frustration of waiting for transport to pick it up was fading away, replaced by the same excitement I had felt when I won the auction. This would be my first time with it, as given that it was on BaT, and in Colorado, I had bought it sight unseen. What could possibly go wrong?

Above: The 4Runner on the day I took delivery

I made it 25 yards before the engine cut out. Luckily, it started up right with a single turn of the key. I made my way to a gas station, as the car looked like it had been sitting in a field since the BaT listing went live. The engine died again as I pulled into the gas station, but I was at a pump, so I cleared the windows and went to start it again, only to find the battery was now dead. I popped the hood to find an empty bird nest. And after clearing that away, I finally enlisted the help of a fellow Toyota driver to jump it, and borrowed some jump leads from one of the gas station employees, and with that, I got it started again. 

The engine seemed to die every time I came to a stop, so I figured I had two options. I could take the regular surface roads, where the engine would likely die at every red light, or I could take I-40, avoiding most of the traffic lights. I chose the latter, leaving the gas station and with some impeccable timing, got through the left turn lane and onto the westbound on-ramp without having to stop (stall) and was on my way home.

I knew that the 22RE is not the most powerful engine in the world, and the automatic transmission was sure to suck a bit more of that power away, but I was still perplexed to find that my top speed was a whopping 55 mph, on flat road… with the gas pedal pinned to the floor. On the bright side, I found out the hazard lights, which the previous owner had said didn’t work, did in fact work. Everything else on the other hand…

I got it back to my apartment where it stalled once more as I pulled into a parking spot, and once again the battery was dead. I got some help from a couple of my neighbors to push it the rest of the way into a parking spot. My plan to go out for a day with my dream car had been ruined, now I had to put my cameras away and figure out what the hell was going on.

I got it to a shop who found that the timing chain was off by two teeth, and got it fixed. For a moment it seemed like I was finally in the clear. I took it up to Snowbowl, where I spent some time skiing before driving back home. For that morning, that little adventure felt almost perfect to what I wanted from the car.

That night I ventured out around sunset, heading back up Snowbowl road to get those scenic photos I never got the chance to get before, and then be back home in time to meet up with a friend of mine who was coming into town. The car overheated and died on my way up the road, the same road I had taken to go skiing that morning. I also had no warning to this, because of course the temperature gauge wasn’t working.

I chatted with my family while the engine cooled. I decided to call it there and head home, the sun was getting too low for the pictures I wanted, and I had to get back to my place in time to meet up with a friend of mine who was coming into town. 

I didn’t make it in time; I got maybe two-thirds the way there when the rod bearings went, and I got to spend the next part of my night at a gas station waiting for a tow. And all I could think was that Bring a Trailer and/or that man in Fort Collins could have at least bought me dinner first.

Luckily my manager at the time recommended a place he had been going to for three decades, and could vouch for. I was able to get it over there and get then engine rebuilt. Their findings were shocking. The engine had deep scoring from a previous engine rebuild (attempt) and was even missing a few bolts. Not broken bolts, missing!

They managed to get it fixed, and it ran perfectly! It felt like a rocket ship compared to before! Then the rod bearings came knocking once more. This time it was faulty parts, and it was all fixed under warranty. And at this point I was graduating, and leaving my college town. At the start of the semester, I thought I was gonna get to spend the last few months in my college town driving around in my dream car, but spent the whole semester just trying to get it running properly. But now it was fixed, and the whole engine rebuild saga was resolved.

And to Bring a Trailer and the previous owner in Fort Collins, Colorado, I think that was better for you than it was for me. Now if you’ll excuse me, I really need a cigarette after that one.

Well actually you can scratch that last part, because there is a fuel leak, and I’d prefer to avoid a Zoolander situation. Oh, and the A/C doesn’t work, and the alternator isn’t charging the battery.

It became a lackluster experience that summer, the Phoenix heat made it impossible to have the motivation to actually work on the thing. It was at this point where I was questioning selling it. My dream car had turned into an absolute nightmare. But there was a fuel leak, and thank god for that.

I got around to fixing the fuel leak once the weather cooled down, rebuilding all the seals on the fuel injectors, and got everything put back together on a nice, cloudy winter day. 

Something was different this time around. Rebuilding the fuel injectors didn’t feel like just another expensive bill. It didn’t leave me feeling like I was picking up the pieces of somebody else’s unfinished project, it felt like I was on the journey I used to dream about.

No, I was not traversing Moab, Patagonia, the Pacific Northwest or the Dalton Highway, but I was working towards that goal. What I had wanted in high school was not just a list of destinations, it was the adventure itself, and this work was part of it, even though I was still in my driveway. The same feeling was repeated on the alternator and the A/C system, and all the other small repairs around the car.

I soon found myself driving in a car that had cold A/C, a charged battery and no longer reeked of gasoline. I no longer wanted to sell it, it was now running the way I wanted it to, and I knew selling it would end with me looking for another first gen 4Runner. So why not keep it? Why not keep making it the way I want it to be?

Now I have a list of things to do. Some are repairs, although none as big as what it needed at first. Other things are modifications, and somewhere down the line, there is a camping setup to be built so I could do all the exploring I have wanted to do since I was in high school.

Once again, it feels like a dream car, like the classic 4×4 I hoped it would be. Now I look forward to doing work on the old 4Runner, and even more so for the adventures that come later. Those adventures were never going to be easy, they weren’t meant to be. Were many of the issues unexpected? Yes, but it runs, the A/C blows cold, the battery charges, it no longer reeks of gasoline and for the first time since buying it, it feels like enough to start the next chapter.