p15-d24 Finland meet-up

[Mark D]

My wife also has direct lineage to England, mayflower transport to be exact. Family name at that point I believe was Goldthwaite if I'm not mistaken.

Myself I am not so lucky, we know we're Irish / Canadian (new foundland), but the church records where lost to fire, so there's no potential to trace lineage past my great grandparents. As it happens I was raised surrounded by 1st generation Finnish neighbors as a child so the Finnish language came easy later in life. My wife has direct Finnish relations here in Finland, but has no Finnish language skills. I guess fate played a part there.

As for the use of the foreign tongue, sorry for the frustration but I don't believe much was used that might take away from the conversation. At least nothing that google translate can't give you a quick insight towards.

As for an update, we are currently in Oulunsalo Finland. Past few days spent visiting family and friends here and in Oulu. Every little trip we take has been great, even grocery shopping in a foreign land is an eye opener.

Today I grabbed a used car sales magazine and copied a bunch of mopar stuff to post. But I can't seem to post images with my iPad, so I'll see if Bob in neversink can grab them from my facebook page and post here for me later.

[randroid]

My48Ruby,

There was no frustration or discomfort in your use of Finnish in your posts; I had just read the latest installment in the "Large block into a P-15" tirade and felt some humor was in order.

Thanks for the "travelogue". It has gotten my to the atlas more than once.

-Randy

[Niel Hoback]

Me too, I bet its beautiful there.

[Dan Hiebert]

Cool thread. My maternal Grandmother was 100% Finnish, but not quite fresh "off-the-boat" - the Linn family started in America with her parent's arrival at Ellis Island. Grandma and her second husband spoke the language amongst themselves pretty often - I think more to not let us you'ungs know what they were saying. Grandma visited relatives in Finland (Helsinki) every couple of years, and I remember that she'd have relatives from Finland and some Finnish friends visiting fairly often. Probably the one thing I'm miffed at my grandparents about is that one pair were fluent in Finnish, and the others in German, but they refused to teach us those languages - but I do know what "sisu" is - that's how everyone described my grandmother.

[Mark D]

Spent the last couple days touring the western coast here in "Suomi". Tried to get togethr with Fireball, but unfortuneately he wasnt able to make it, as he was heading out to budapest for his anniversary celebration witht his wife. We left Oulunsalo on Sunday morning and contacted Uncle Pekka on the road. We arranged to meet at his parents place in Kokkola and arrived near 3pm, a little later than expected. While there we were treated to some good conversation, a much apprecited snack and refreshment, and a tour of Pekka's projects, past and current as well as his fathers projects. Some real neat stuff for sure. After the tour we followed Pekka and his wife and sir 77 Chrysler imperial (sweet car by the way), over to his clubs meet about 10km's down the road.

I took at least a hundred pics, but can't post them to this forum from the iPad. Headed out to grab some late supper now, will see if I can arrange an upload to a picture host and post a URL later. Been seeing a lot of antique US autos on the roads here, followed today as well.

Edited August 6, 2012 by My48Ruby

[Uncle-Pekka]

We had a very good Sunday afternoon with Mark and Tracey, indeed.

Luckily our club had this little get-togeher happening at sea side camping park. Not much cars or people but excellent weather and very good intimate atmosphere... I'll also postpictures as soon as I'll have time (busy painting the Dodge this week)

Speaking about weather, obviously Mark brought sunny weather from North to us:

It rained out through all Friday & Saturday, even Sunday morning. At noon rain ceased and 3PM sun was shining! Too bad an afternoon goes by so fast, when you have a good time with friends.

[greg g]

Did you by any chance see any of the WORLD RAlly Cup cars or support vehicles? they were in Finland this past weeked.

gotta luv the crowd and the yumps!!!!

http://www.wrc.com/calendar-and-rallies/2012/neste-oil-rally-finland/video/rally-finland-saturday-evening-wrap/?vid=2611&pg=1

[Mark D]

Greg, We were thinking we might make it for a day to the WRC, but time with the family is so precious while we are here we tend to maximize that.

Spent the night in Turku by the sea woke this morning to see one of the Silja line Silja line cruise liners parked outside my window. Today we are off to the port of Hanko to see the place where Tracey's great grandfather left for America. Then on to Helsinki for the afternoon to visit the national museum and the open air marketplace. Tonight will be spent in a grand hotel repacking for the trip home tomorrow.

Edited August 7, 2012 by My48Ruby

[Mark D]

After a long days traveling, we touched down in Boston last night at 6:30pm EST after leaving Helsinki at 3:30pm local time. We made a quick layover stop in Iceland. We flew Icelandair and I highly recomend the airline for its service and for the fact they've never lost our luggage, which is more than I can claim with Finnair. It was a long day and by the time we got to bed the clock on the night stand said 10pm, but the internal clocks were shouting 5am, about 7 hours ahead. We had a great trip and clocked about 2200km's on the ODO of the Opel we drove, which as it turns out was extremely economical considering the near $7/gallon gas prices. We burned just about 5 tanks of gas altogether.

One of these days I'll get around to sorting out the 1800 pictures we took, but as I know there are skeptics that question an events actual happening without photo proof I offer the following. Yours truly on the right side of the photo, a period 70's dressed Pekka on the left.

[greg g]

staying alive..... Welcome back.

[BobT-47P15]

Mark.......glad you had a good trip and made it home safely.

Just shows this is a truly international forum nowadays.

Was there a special occasion on tap, or does Pekka dress like

that all the time? He looks mighty sharp there.

[randroid]

Mark,

I was going to comment of Unkka's dapper appearance too, but I bet he plays hell hitchhiking in that get-up in the winter.

-Randy

[Mark D]

His attire is related to the Kokkola car club meet. Some of the members dressed in period with the cars they drove. He and his wife fit well with the 77 Chrysler. Photos to follow as soon as I resize a few of them to fit the size restrictions of the forum.

[Mark D]

He's got a real nice Chrysler originally from Utah. The other photos are from the club meeting. Mopar was really well represented by his club, not shown was a '55 Desoto in addition to a '57 dodge, a mid '60s Imperial, and a '54? Chrysler. Even had a real nice Kaiser Manhattan present. I even saw something I had never seen before, a mid 60's English Ford Zephyr.

[Uncle-Pekka]

Hi Folks,

The Dodge now has bright new paint job! Finally!

Bad news is I probably will not have time enough to get her on the road before winter (= it will be may 2013 before we'll hit the road...)

...thus I will take a few minutes to post some pictures we took at the sunday evening car meet with Mark here in Kokkola area:

This is the 1962 Ford Zephyr Mk.III Mark mentioned above:

...and the Kaiser...

... Model T with period correct Lady and "His Masters Voice"-device...

...1967 Imperial 4D HT...

...1957 Dodge Custom Royal...

... My 1977 New Yorker and 1955 Imperial (The Black Pearl)...

Edited August 12, 2012 by Uncle-Pekka

[Niel Hoback]

Nice show! I love that Kaiser.

[Mark D]

Nice pictures Pekka - cant wait to see the dodge in its new glory!

[Uncle-Pekka]

Thanks Mark,

Unfortunately my holidays are over and I had to return to Jyväskylä in past Friday.

I brought some trim parts with me and hope to get time to visit Kokkola for a couple of weekends in end of Aug./beg. of Sept. to continue the re-assembly of the Dodge...

It was so rainy last week, that I did not even took photos of the car before leaving Kokkola. I will prepare some pictures later on in the autumn.

Br.,

Pekka

[Fireball]

Glad to see you made it home allright Mark, although what a shame we didn't have chance to meet f2f. Can you folks believe we were like 10 miles from each other... But I was working and he had tight schedule so things didn't work out, and then I left to Hungary in the middle of the week. Close but no cigar

Pekka, I've been outta this forum so long that I don't even know the details of your build, what color did you choose? Any modifications or are you keeping it stock? Have you noticed btw. that my old D-24 has been for sale elsewhere quite a long http://www.nettiauto.com/dodge/club-coupe/4614306

[Mark D]

Yes Tero, we are safely back home, but wishing I was still there on holiday. Leaving Finland was hard this time around. Too many tears from relatives that wish we lived closer. Lots of crying when we left oulunsalo. But it fuels the desire to return to Suomi, so we will likely be back again soon. My best guess is 2015 at this point. Next year I hear that there is an invasion of Finns coming to visit us... by the way, just as I told Pekka, you are welcome to visit us here in the states if you are in the neighborhood! My "mokki" by the lake is always ready for guests. Cool to see your old d24 advertisement! Did you ever get a replacement for your garage?

[Fireball]

Thanks for the invite Mark, actually we are planning for a month in states again next year but let's see how things roll, depends on work as always. My wish is to tour around, family wants to stay in Orlando again.

I have always something going on in the garage, but this I wouldn't call a "replacement" for Dodge, rather an forced trade for my Harley and now I've been trying to get rid of it.

http://www.nettiauto.com/pontiac/fiero/5015307 Really nice car but I have no use for it. I just painted it lowered it and changed the wheels, Fiero has been my daily user for the summer. I want '58 Edsel next but from now on I'm keeping my fleet in one vehicle at a time so this has to go first. Then it's time for ebay and craigslist...

[Uncle-Pekka]

...

Pekka, I've been outta this forum so long that I don't even know the details of your build, what color did you choose? Any modifications or are you keeping it stock? Have you noticed btw. that my old D-24 has been for sale elsewhere quite a long http://www.nettiauto.com/dodge/club-coupe/4614306

Hi 'Ball,

Yes I noticed your kustom at sale. The price is right but market in Finland is ve..ery slow today. As you recall, we had a party of three who imported D24's to Finland in winter of '06. You and Pena did build your cars very nice in no time at all, but I just heard also Pena has sold his car and apparently concentrating in horses (?)... I hope you will pick up another 40's-50's project one of these days - Would be a pleasure to follow up your project again.

My project is not restoration, neither customizing. May sound dull, but I only aim to put it dependable and tidy driving condition. And DRIVE the flathead. I will drop it a tad to achieve stance to my likes. Also load with accessories as visor, skirts, beauty rings, spotlight, etc. I little bit towards to mexican build style, but not as bold. The colour is dark blue. Somewhere in between battleship gray and navy blue, if you excuse me playing with big words.

Due to my garage problems, I had a couple of side kicks in past three years. The Struggle started with unlucky '61 Caddy import lead to '77 New Yorker and the 1951 Nash Statesman, which I overhauled mechanically and now sold this summer as I finally managed to paint the Dodge.

Edited August 19, 2012 by Uncle-Pekka