We were quite surprised to find heavy boat scrap parts, ravaged, nearly sunk rafts and barges and even a true ghost ship from the former rafting dock of Halla sawmill. After sawmilling, the island has served transportation industry and there has been a small ship terminal at this place, but these wrecks don't have much to do with that. Instead, they are fleet abandoned by Russians and transported to Halla for later use, which in some cases has meant scrapping.

The Ghost Ship, m/s Vetluga, is one of the numerous accommodation ships built for the Soviet Union between 1950's and late 1980's. She's served the the Sickle and the Hammer accommodating hundreds of workers assigned to huge construction projects somewhere out on the seas. After abandoning, the ship was bought back to Finland by a firm, whose intention was to convert it and a few other similar ships into floating hotels. However, financial trouble halted conversion works after the first one had been finished. Other ships were sold to different users, but m/s Vetluga stayed in Halla until 2004, when she was hauled to Estonia.

Ja turhuuksista rakennetut laivat uppoavat satamaan... --cmx