I live in Möltenort, on the east side of the fjord. Sometimes it still feels like it did a hundred years ago. I travel to work in the city centre of Kiel on the fjord steamer. My job is communications and partner acquisition for the Ocean Race Europe, which will start from Kiel in August 2025.

In winter it gets quiet, the ferry timetable offers only a few options, everything goes quiet.

An hour ago, fisherman Björn Fischer (yes, that's his real name) moored his cutter in Möltenort harbour. There is butt. At six o'clock in the morning, three tired figures are already standing by the cutter and Björn hands them the fish.

Moin. 

Jo, Moin. 

Here in Kiel you know that the well-known "Moin-moin" is already babble. It doesn't have to be.

Seagulls greet me at the jetty, but even they are still tired. Only when the ferry steamer arrives do they leisurely fly off the dolphin with the mooring line. 

On board, I prefer to stay outside. It's only a short trip for me, once next door to Mönkeberg, then over to Bellevue.

When the guests from Gothenburg pass the narrow point at Möltenort in the Kiel Fjord on the Stenaline in the morning, my ferry steamer is just leaving. Together we travel to Kiel, right into the city centre. Some to go on holiday. Me, to work.

As we sail parallel through the fjord, I can feel the rumbling in the hull and the slight swaying, past the red port buoys of the fairway, hazy weather.

The grey immerses water, air, shore and people in an all-connecting commonality, while the white bubbling wake matches the villas on the Düsternbrok Coast. Bellevue is the name of the stop there, and I can't say which is more „belle vue“: the view from the large windows or my view from the ferry of the water.

Behind me is the Falkenstein lighthouse, in front of me my desk. Everything comes together in these moments, time stands still when I'm on my way to work. I love it.

©Kiel-Marketing GmbH

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Fördedampfer Kiel timetable