Watch: This is Charlotte, a 1985 Vanagon Westfalia

The ultimate arbiter, when it comes to determining whether or not a car is good, is your butt. And maybe your heart, too.

What it is not, is numbers. Numbers—horsepower figures, cargo capacity, lap times—are evidence, not conclusions. They can bolster a claim, be deeply interesting, and be proof of excellence, but they are not the excellence we sometimes claim they are.

And no vehicle is better proof of that than the Vanagon. None of its numbers impress. No single part of it is revolutionary. And yet its combination of size, humility, and charm has ingratiated it into the public imagination.

Hagerty’s latest video features Tyler Hamersma’s 1985 Vanagon Westfalia. Despite having been into sports cars all his life, Hamersma claims that few cars are as fun to drive as his Vanagon because it has as many square feet of space as it does horsepower.

The combination makes it a fascinating drive and the excitement he sees from the people he drives by helps to make it much more than the sum of its numbers.

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