Join us this week as we squeeze into Sergiu Topala’s Rover Mini Cooper for a ride around Moldova. Though produced in 1994, his little British box roundly recalls the styling and engineering that made the name so famous in the 1960s, and in keeping with the more modern model year, this Mini is subjected to long road trips and anything else that one might do in a normal car, albeit one with no air-conditioning or power steering.
With years of experience working with vehicles like his Mini, Sergiu’s privy to all the tricks and issues that can crop up when purchasing a vintage enthusiast’s car. In fact, he recalls a trend in which a good lot of left-hand drive Minis from Continental Europe were scooped up, converted to right-hand drive, and then sold back to their home country in a strangely roundabout and not-quite-right type of homecoming. Some of these were even re-converted and sold outside of the UK for a second time, so when looking for one of his own, Sergiu knew it had to untouched in this regard.
The car that he eventually purchased has none of this sketchy history, and coming from the twilight decade of the original shape’s production run, it is well-suited to creating many years of new memories. Of course, even a newer Rover Mini Cooper is still going to epitomize simplicity and eschew extravagance though. That’s no issue though when it comes to those lengthy road trips, as the later, ‘90s-era Minis were geared towards even greater accessibility than the originals. Retaining the same efficient layout and cheap entry point, these later Minis were designed for longer excursions and an overall greater frequency of use over the earlier models, and so were fitted with motors that spun the odometer with ease both around town and on the open road. Herein lies the reason for Sergiu’s choice.
“I didn’t buy this car for a collection,” he says, “I got it to drive it.” Adding to this, he speaks of his Mini as if it were a good friend or f
