Kiel Cruise Port

Cruise ships in Kiel dock at three berths on the Kieler Förde (Kiel Fjord): the Ostseekai (Baltic Quay), the Schwedenkai (Sweden Quay) and the Norwegenkai (Norway Quay). Which one your ship uses is on your cruise documents, and the line, not the city, tells you where to show up. All three sit on the fjord in the central part of Kiel rather than at an industrial port miles out of town, which is the single most useful thing to know about this port: the city starts more or less where the gangway ends.

One word on the name. Germans say Kieler Förde, an inlet of the Baltic Sea, and it is not a Norwegian-style fjord carved by glaciers into rock. It is a long, calm, working stretch of water with shipyards, naval vessels, ferries to Scandinavia and sailboats sharing the same lanes. Watching that traffic is a large part of the point of being here.

If your ship gives you a single day, do not try to cover the whole fjord. Pick one of two shapes for the day: stay on the western shore and walk, or get on the water and head north toward Laboe. Both work, and both are written up as full hour-by-hour plans:

• Kiel in One Day - The highlights in a nutshell: the Kiellinie, the GEOMAR Aquarium, Holstenstrasse, St Nicholas' Church and a ferry ride on the fjord.
• Maritime Kiel - A day for ship fans: the Kiellinie, the naval harbor, the Holtenau lock on the Kiel Canal, submarine U-995 and the Laboe Naval Memorial.
• Kiel Canal Tour - A day at the canal: the Holtenau lock, the lighthouse and lifting bridges, a canal cruise and the view of the great shipping traffic.

A note on timing that cruise passengers underestimate: German museums outside the big cities are widely closed on Mondays, and the seasonal sights on the fjord run shorter hours outside the summer months. Every attraction page linked here lists the hours we have on file. Check yours before you plan the afternoon around it, and always work backwards from your ship's all-aboard time rather than its departure time.

The single best value in Kiel is the Fjord Ferry (SFK). These are not tour boats, they are public transit: the SFK ferries are part of the local transport network and cross the fjord all day, which means you pay a normal transit fare (from 3 EUR) for a boat ride past shipyards, naval berths, sailing yachts and beaches. Locals call it the mini cruise, which is a good joke to make while you are standing on the deck of an actual cruise ship.

Ride it in whichever direction fits your day. Northbound the fjord opens out toward the Baltic and Laboe; southbound you get the city, the shipyard cranes and the inner harbor. Either way it costs a fraction of a shore excursion and gives you the view people actually come to Kiel for.

The Kiellinie Promenade is the waterfront promenade and the spine of any walk in Kiel: roughly 3.5 kilometers, about two miles, running from the city center along the western shore up to the marine sciences institute. It is flat, paved, lined with cafés and floating jetties, and it puts you eye-level with everything moving on the fjord. Admission is exactly what a sidewalk costs.

Right on that promenade sits the GEOMAR Aquarium, part of the Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research (from 6 EUR). The tanks cover the Baltic, the North Sea and tropical waters, but the crowd-pleaser is the open-air seal pool. Posted hours: Daily 9am–7pm (seasonal), seal feeding 10am & 2:30pm.

For the overview shot, the Kiel Town Hall Tower is the place. The tower went up between 1907 and 1911, stands 67 meters tall, about 220 feet, and was modeled on the campanile of St Mark's in Venice, of all things. A lift and a short flight of stairs get you to the platform, and the view takes in the city center, the Kleiner Kiel and the fjord (from 3 EUR). Access is limited: Tours May–Sep, dates as posted.

At the head of the inner fjord, the Hörn Bridge is a three-part folding bascule bridge that opens by folding itself into an N shape to let boats through. There are only a handful like it anywhere. It opens several times a day and draws a small crowd every time. Free.

The Kiel Maritime Museum occupies a listed 1910 fish hall on the Sartorikai, right on the water, and it is the fastest way to understand what you are looking at out the window: shipping, shipbuilding and fishing on this fjord, told with ship models, nautical instruments and a giant sperm-whale skeleton. Historic vessels lie in the museum harbor outside, some of them open to visitors. Admission is free admission. Posted hours: Tue–Sun 10am–6pm.

Out where the fjord meets the open Baltic stands the Laboe Naval Memorial, built between 1927 and 1936 and shaped like a stylized ship's bow. It rises 85 meters, roughly 280 feet, and you can see it from most of the fjord. Today it commemorates those lost at sea of all nations and stands as a monument to peaceful seafaring. A lift and stairs reach the viewing platform, and the panorama over the Baltic, the fjord and Kiel on the far shore is the best in the region (from 8 EUR). Posted hours: Daily 9:30am–6pm (seasonal).

Directly below it on the beach lies U 995 Submarine, the only surviving submarine of the Type VII C, the most-built class of the Second World War. You walk through the whole boat: engine room, torpedo rooms, command center, crew quarters. It is genuinely cramped, and that is the exhibit. Built in 1943, returned by Norway after the war and opened as a museum ship in 1971 (from 4 EUR). Posted hours: Daily 9:30am–6pm (seasonal).

Both sit on the eastern side of the fjord's mouth, so the ferry is the natural way to reach them, and the ride is half the reason to go.

The Kiel Canal, in German the Nord-Ostsee-Kanal and historically the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, opened in 1895 and runs 98 kilometers, about 61 miles, from Kiel-Holtenau to Brunsbüttel on the Elbe. It is the busiest artificial sea waterway in the world, saving ships the long haul around the top of Denmark. If you have searched "kiel canal" before your cruise, this is it, and its eastern end is inside the city.

That eastern end is the Holtenau Locks, four lock chambers, two large ones from 1914 and two older, smaller ones, that equalize the water level between the canal and the Baltic. There is a viewing platform on the lock site, and watching a full-size freighter or cruise ship get locked through from a few dozen yards away is the sort of thing that turns into your favorite photo of the trip. Free.

Kieler Woche, Kiel Week in English, is the largest sailing event in the world and it takes over the entire waterfront every June. If your cruise happens to start or end during it, expect the city to be at full volume: thousands of boats, stages along the fjord, and the promenade packed. It is a spectacular time to be in port and a hard time to find a hotel room, so plan the extra night early. Kiel Week Guide explains how the week is structured and where to stand.