A while ago we were honoured to handle a membership application, where we could spot a very familiar name. The esteemed gentleman has served on GTS Finnjet longer than any other person. The legend of Finnjet and the final Finnish Chief engineer, Mr Juhani Puonti.

As we departed on our 2009 society cruise, I had high hopes of hearing stories from the days when Finnjet was built, up to the final days of Finnish management during 2006 in the Bahamas. These wishes were met and surpassed in an amazing manner. Every evening for hours and hours, I had the privilege to hear about the machine and her people without any censorship.

On top of this, our Chief engineer gave us close to 800 photographs to work with.

A few crew members who had worked in the restaurant and hotel facilities on Finnjet complained about our website being rather technical. This is quite true. We would like to change this to contain also softer values and materials, but as you can see, we are powered by Chief engineers right now. Please do send us materials.

But at this opportunity I wish to thank Mr Puonti for his contribution to our society.

In the picture: Chief engineer Juhani Puonti (11^th April, 2006)

-RK

My thank you's to everyone who took part in this historic cruise, which assembled to honour a ship that is no more.

First of all, I wish to thank Mrs Ritva Pulli for arranging our cruise and the bulk of the program. We couldn't have done it without her. The Finnjet -spirit truly lives in her.

I thank the crew of M/S Finnmaid for their tireless work, even after hours, to keep us in drink and good spirits. The barkeeper, purser, chief engineer and captain were all former Finnjet crews. Never before have I been greeted on board with a hug and never before has a captain taken the time to shake my hand. On this cruise I saw that no matter how fine a ship is, the crews are the true heart of the vessel. No fake smiles, these were truly good people with real smiles from the heart.

I wish to thank the crews of Finnjet, who entertained and educated us with talk, speeches, performances, song and laughter. You don't need a band when you have entertainers such as Hemmo, Holkeri, Arvid and many other fine people.

I also wish to thank the Finnjet crews for making us non-crews feel welcome on board as passionate friends of Finnjet.

I want to thank our society members who took part in our cruise. I am certain that our society has the friendliest people of them all.

Thank you for all who took part in the board meeting. I am really glad that we took the time to arrange it. We went thru 11 issues during the meeting. Impressive. These new short timeframe projects will bring our society to a new level.

Furthermore, I wish to thank Finnlines Oyj for the glass of champagne and for the platform where to arrange our special cruise.

To be surrounded by so many friends and friendly people, it has been quite a while. Thank you all for showing me the Finnjet -spirit once again. 68.

-RK

Finnlines has yet again adjusted our cruise program.

- Arrival at Rostock as scheduled.

- A bus/busses will take us to LÜBECK! (We can leave our luggage in the ship)

- M/V Finnmaid moves to Travemünde during the day.

- We'll experience Lübeck and then we will be taken to TRAVEMÜNDE!

- In Travemünde we will meet the M/V Finnmaid again and the cruise will continue as scheduled.