Car spotting: A Frugal London game

I’d been on the streets less than an hour when I spotted my first supercar. It was a Lamborghini Gallardo, the Spyder version in yellow. Its driver was lane-changing through rush-hour traffic, heedless of others. The exhaust note – and occasional flame – signaled the gear changes.

Irresponsible, of course, but for guys with the “zoom gene,” a delight to watch and hear.

This cheap-thrills game is called “car spotting.” London is the perfect venue: more supercars per strip of asphalt than any global capital I’ve visited. When my brother and I visited London a couple of years ago, we’d compete to see which of us was first to spot $1 million worth of exotics, which we defined as cars costing more than $100,000.

This trip, spotting a $1 million worth of cars took less than one day. Here’s what I saw:

Ferrari F430, $186,000
Bentley Arnage, $222,000
Aston Martin DB9 Volante, $182,000
Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder, $188,000
Audi R8, $109,000
Mercedes Benz S63 AMG, $131,000