Not seen on U.S. shores since the early ’90s is the Alfa Romeo Spider such as this 1978 example. The seller tells us that this was a “bucket list” present for his wife but that list moved upscale with dreams of a Porsche Boxter and now the poor old Alfa is getting kicked to the curb. This 62K mile example looks nice and may well be the perfect inclusion on someone else’s bucket list. Arkie found this discovery for us, it’s located in Dallas, Texas and is available here on craigslist where it can be yours for $5,000.

Many years back I had this silly text-mangling habit of calling these an Alfa Romero – you know like something that Cesar Romero would drive. Well, I think (hope) that’s beyond me. This 1978 Spider is a member of Series 2 which spanned the years 1970 through 1982 (total Spider production covered the years 1966-1993) and its American certification is best represented by its big, black, ugly federal 5 MPH bumpers. It’s unfortunate as this Spider is a nice-looking balanced sports car and had more eyeball appeal when it wore tucked-in chrome plated pieces. OK, so there’s not much that can be done about the bumper requirement but the rest of the exterior shows quite well with its deep red finish and black fabric top. The body yields no indication of rust or improperly repaired body panels though the seller mentions “a small dent on the fender” – I can’t find it.

A 110 net HP, 2.0 liter, in-line, four-cylinder engine allows this Alfa to “run great” according to the seller. He further adds, “Fires up right away and runs through the gears as it should. It steers, stops and goes very well“. A five-speed manual transmission adds to the driving enjoyment.

The interior is not well photographed but what is included in the listing reveals tan leather upholstery and matching door cards. I would suggest that this Spider hasn’t spent too much time in top-down mode as the upholstery, despite its 45 years of age and reported 62K miles of use, still shows quite well. The center stack and gauges have a very refined Italian feel about themselves and of course, it wouldn’t be an Alfa Romeo sports car without a polished, high-quality wooden steering wheel.

Some statistics will state that there were about 110K Spiders built over its 28-year production run with ’78 being responsible for about 3,800 copies. I can recall a time when these were a reasonably common sight on American highways and byways but that’s been a good number of years now (probably back in my Alfa Romero days). It’s a neat car but it’s not on my bucket list, but how about yours?