Saying farewell to the Toyota FJ Cruiser, the modern beach buggy

In a lineup well-stocked with rational vehicles, the Toyota FJ Cruiser has always been a happy anomaly, a real-life concept car that’s been embraced by more than 200,000 buyers so far. With its clamshell doors, retro-futuristic styling and genuine off-road chops, the FJ catered to the cohort who would’ve bought a new FJ40 Land Cruiser if it were still in production. Nobody needed an FJ Cruiser—the four-door 4Runner is more practical and basically as capable off-road—but the FJ was a fun digression, a genuine Jeep Wrangler alternative for people who actually take their SUVs off-road. I say “was,” because the FJ will bow out after 2014, its sales having dwindled to the point that it got the axe rather than a redesign. However, with the release of the 2014 Trail Teams Ultimate Edition, the FJ is at least going out in style.

Toyota is building 2,500 Ultimate Editions, each wearing Heritage Blue paint and a white grille surround that makes for an obvious evocation of the FJ40 glory days. It’s got some nice hardware, too, with coil-over Bilstein front suspension and remote-reservoir rear shocks, a thick aluminum skid plate, and TRD bead lock wheels with BF Goodrich All-Terrain tires. To send it off, I decided to take the FJ to a place where SUVs still rule and crossovers drool: the beach.