Have you ever wondered what a shipping company does during the so-called "winter break"? Well, first of all, after New Year's Eve, it's vacation time for our colleagues on board. After all, everyone who works in our nautical and catering departments has to work when others are on vacation.
But even now, at the end of January and beginning of February, there is plenty of activity behind the scenes. Our ships are being prepared and made ready for the upcoming season. For example, there is still some work to be done on the MS RheinPerle, which was completely rebuilt and modernized last year. (More on this another time.)
We have a number of trade fair appearances coming up in winter and spring. For example, we will be exhibiting at the Koblenz tourism fair on the first weekend in February and at the hera wedding fair in Troisdorf at the end of February (see our last blog post).
But sometimes the work we have to do in winter is a bit more conspicuous.
On Monday, it must have almost looked to passers-by as if a pirate ship was stealing our jetty at the Bastei. In fact, our jetty 13 was dismantled and taken to the shipyard to be repaired. After all, even a jetty needs to be checked and maintained at regular intervals so that guests can continue to board our ships safely and comfortably at all times in the future.
And so it was possible to see what it looks like when a mooring bridge goes on a journey. Thanks for the photos go to Christian and Fabian Nahrendorf, who documented the removal in Cologne, and to our skipper Hans Adam, who followed the journey of the jetty on his bicycle.
