The ‘Norwegian Dream’ on the Kiel Canal

The largest canal ship is always a welcome visitor
Captain Aage Hoddevik cannot help smiling. High above him, on the Grünental high bridge at kilometer 30, a dense crowd has gathered. Hundreds of arms wave through the air. “That’s our fan club,” explains the towering Norwegian, visibly moved as he presses the foghorn button. Three long blasts from the mighty horn of the “Norwegian Dream”: greetings and thanks. Hoddevik beams: “By now, at the latest, people in Schleswig-Holstein know: We’re back!”

The spectacle is repeated seven times every year. “And they’re always up there with their huge Champion banner.” The snow-white-uniformed captain waves from the port bridge wing and swings his cap. The passengers on deck, mostly North and South Americans, do the same. They are thrilled by the hundreds. They are also delighted by the trip along the “high-seas highway,” the silver ribbon between the seas: “Better than the Panama Canal,” says Canadian hotel director Brad Gallant. The “Dream” has perfect weather on this May day: a brilliant, dream-ship sky, as if specially ordered.

Under siege
At 50,760 GT, 230 meters long, 29 meters wide and with a draft of 6.7 meters, the NCL liner is the largest ship that can just squeeze through the Kiel Canal. One absolute peculiarity: its enormous funnel has to be folded down. This specialized design came from the Lloyd Werft shipyard in Bremerhaven, which lengthened and refitted the vessel by forty meters in 1989. The bridges allow a maximum height of just over 39 meters. The same applies to her sister ship, the “Norwegian Wind.”
“Bon voyage!” can still be heard from many voices, until the bridge gliding over the ship silences the chorus. But just a few hundred meters farther on, the canal is “under siege” once again. They have arrived in motorhomes, cars, on bicycles and on foot to admire “their Dream,” waving Norwegian and American flags. The white giant remains the Sunday attraction in Germany’s northernmost state for another 67 kilometers. Aage Hoddevik repeatedly lets the powerful foghorn roar. The pilots on the canal ferries join in the signal concert every time, raising goosebumps on the ship lovers. In Rendsburg, Captain Hoddevik stands at attention as the ship greeting station beneath the railway high bridge plays the Norwegian national anthem.

Greetings to Kiel
Beyond Sehestedt, between Königsförde (kilometer 80) and Neu-Wittenbek (kilometer 90), the waterway gets tight. During dinner on the glass-enclosed sun deck, it feels as though the “Norwegian Dream” is shaving the trees. Precision work for the canal pilot at the helm. Only the guests hold their breath.
After just under eight hours of leisurely cruising past elegant manor houses, through forests, meadows, pastures and fields, with sweeping views across the land between the seas and the scent of the countryside in the air, the cruise ship threads its way into the southern chamber of the Kiel-Holtenau Canal locks. Without a hitch or a scratch. “Routine for us,” one of the mooring crew coolly comments on the maneuver. The Breiholz Volunteer Fire Brigade band, which had kept spirits high on the pool deck during the passage through the canal, plays the march “Greetings to Kiel” as a farewell, to applause from the spectators lining the rail.

Heading for St. Petersburg, the “Norwegian Dream” makes its way into the evening fjord. Its Christmas-tree lights remain visible on the Baltic Sea for a long time.
 
Text and photos: Peer Schmidt-Walther

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