You want a Suzuki Samurai but fear it’s not brawny enough. Or, perhaps a Ford Bronco II, but it doesn’t have a great off road reputation. Perhaps an Isuzu Trooper – but it does seem like those aren’t as unique as they once were. If you want a truck that can play in the mud and look tough doing it while being plenty rare, the Daihatsu Rocky may be a solid choice. It certainly looks like an off-road bruiser and it’s quite rare despite being officially sold in the U.S. This Rocky listed here on Facebook Marketplace is a running, driving example that comes with the factory hardtop for $6,500.

Now, as someone who owns a 1989 Isuzu Trooper RS, throwing shade at it for being a little too commonplace is a bit of an exaggeration. Troopers are not something you see every day, especially where I live. However, in the southeast and out west, you still see plenty of them running around, which is a testament to their reliability and usefulness. In the case of the Rocky, I don’t care where you go in the U.S.A., it’s a hard truck to find. This has much to do with how limited Daihatsu’s dealer network was stateside when it was still selling vehicles here, as those franchises only had the Rocky and the bare bones Charade to offer U.S. customers.

The Rocky really was a vehicle meant for an island lifestyle. In fact, throughout the 80s and 90s, if you went to an island like the Bahamas or the Caymans to vacation, you most likely saw a ton of these Rockys running around. Any place you didn’t need to get up to significant highway speeds was perfect for the Rocky, since those same environments likely had plenty of unpaved roads. The Rocky was powered by a humble 1.6L engine with 94 horsepower on tap, and it needed every bit of strength that mill could muster. There’s a certain charm that comes from hustling a compact car without a ton of speed, as you can make up for it in the corners. In a stiffly sprung SUV, there’s really no joy that comes from winding out an engine like this.

The same can be said for the Samurai, of course, but if you grenade that engine, you can find a replacement before too long. The Rocky might prove more challenging to source parts for, at least stateside. Plenty of island communities still use Daihatsus of different generations as daily transport, so with a bit of internet sleuthing, you can likely find whatever replacement part you’re looking for. I did hop onto Rock Auto to see what was still available for the Rocky, and it’s clear the list of parts still sold has dwindled significantly, with most available stock limited to generic components (brake calipers are clearly MIA, as is a timing belt kit.) The seller claims this one runs and drives great, so maybe he grabbed some spare parts before they started to dry up.