Adventure: Atlantic crossing with container freighter

Text by Phillip Gätz

The motorway winds its way out of the Elbe tunnel, right into the heart of the Port of Hamburg. This is where its heart beats, even today in the heavy rain. On the right is the exit to Waltershof. Our destination is the Eurogate Terminal with its skyline of loading bridges. Containers piled high form their own street canyons, a city within the city. A red wall looms behind it: the ship. "It's huge," I say, feeling a tremendous sense of respect. I've never seen anything as big and impressive up close as the "Cap San Marco", 333 metres long, the container freighter, one of the giants in the Hamburg Süd fleet.

After presenting all the necessary papers - and there are a lot of them - I take the shuttle bus to the gangway. I have 50 kilos of photo equipment for my task in umpteen bags, as well as clothes for every eventuality - after all, I will experience almost four seasons in four weeks. Now there are only 72 steep steps left. I am offered help, but I want to make it alone. When I reach the top, my knees are shaking, even with excitement. Now, in September 2019, after seven long months of struggle and cramp to fulfil this dream, everything is suddenly happening so quickly, perhaps too quickly.

Container freighter is not like a dream ship

A cadet on watch jumps up: "Sir, let me help. Are you visiting?" I'm still standing beside myself and just nod. But my companions pay more attention: "No, he's staying on board. He's travelling with us." Joy all round: a new face on a month-long cruise is always welcome. I can't even grasp the impressions yet when another crew member takes my bags from me and loads them into a lift three bulkheads away, along with me and my entourage from Hamburg Süd. I think I'm under construction. "Hello," says my helper now, "I'm Holger, let's get you to the station." It's going to be a key moment, because Holger, whose overalls show signs of heavy labour and officially smell of oil, is not only not much younger than me, but also a second officer.

I must have watched too much "Traumschiff" with my grandparents as a child and was sure that a white Sascha Hehn memorial uniform was mandatory for such a position, always. I get the owner's cabin. From the beginning to the end of the journey in South America. To be precise, the destination is Buenos Aires, Argentina. The cabin is free, no owner in sight. Accommodation as spacious as a hotel suite in Las Vegas in the wild nineties. Only: no luxury here, more functional charm. The only thing missing is Siegfried and Roy for the big show. But I meet them later, in the person of the captain and the chief engineer, as well as all the other "makers" of my dream workshop.

Sleep is almost unthinkable due to the excitement

The ship is big, unbelievably big. I'm shown around for a day as part of the safety briefing and (it feels like) a thousand other relevant protocols, approved by the third officer. Paulina comes from Poland: "Have you ever been on a container freighter?" she asks in English, the language spoken on board. "Well," I reply, "rather on smaller ships, pleasure craft, usually about five to eight metres long." She laughs. The "Cap San Marco" has been in Hamburg for 48 hours, time for some initial, cautious explorations. I've only seen ships like this and the huge terminal on television. Everything is big, loud and brutal, day and night. At the end of the day, I watch the action outside from my cabin for hours. "The programme with the mouse" comes true.

When I wake up, I still have the camera in my hand. When I am introduced to our "old man" at breakfast in the officers' mess in a group of around twelve high-ranking people, you can tell that I have hardly slept. The ratings, i.e. the lower ranks, dine in their own mess with Asian-influenced cuisine. There are people from countless nations, friendly, helpful and open. Not least a result of respectful equal treatment away from the necessary hierarchy of ranks, as I realise during the trip. The officers' cuisine is more European in flavour. If you fancy it, you can combine both worlds, at least in culinary terms. Later, there will be a night at sea when I visit the always-accessible galley myself, dig out the sandwich toaster and serve it up to the general delight of the entire bridge watch.

Once around the container freighter, it takes 17 minutes

When I still have time to familiarise myself with the ship in Hamburg, the thought "You can't grasp the size of it" becomes ingrained in my mind. I have to keep going to the bridge, the stern, the bow and deep into the cargo holds so that my brain can get an overall picture of the dimensions. It takes almost eight minutes to walk from one end to the other (there's no running on a ship!). Once round, it takes 17 minutes. If you had a dog, that would be more than enough. The size of the crew, on the other hand, is manageable at just under thirty people. I got to know them all before we set sail. The entire crew, including the captain and officers, are relatively young. The average age is just 35. That's a great basis, of course. And they are also interested in my project of capturing life on board in photographs. Something different.

It's not just me who gets nervous just before setting off. Suddenly everyone starts to get hectic - like a family about to set off on a week-long holiday in the Multivan. Have we really got everything? Let's go then! Just like in a real soap opera, the clouds break open at the last minute. The sun is shining, there's even a rainbow over the city. Anyone who has never travelled down the Elbe towards the North Sea, like me as a newcomer, is more than moved by the scenario. It's amazing how the ship sets sail while I watch the spectacle of the tugboats on the bridge. My "hotel" suddenly starts to move. Slowly at first, then faster. Blankenese and the Airbus factory pass by from a height of forty metres, people wave, and I realise that millions of sailors have experienced the same thing here over the centuries: We are leaving home - off into the unknown!

A container freighter is not an amusement park

The first days at sea. We pass European harbours such as Antwerp and Le Havre. I soak up the atmosphere and the experiences and become familiar with the crew. I become part of the crew, get to know them and their way of life on the ship - somewhere between docking and casting off manoeuvres, unloading, shifts, gym, mess, karaoke, sauna, pool or at the table tennis table. Of course, the container freighter "Cap San Marco" is not a leisure park: although there are many amenities for the crew, one must not forget that these men and women sometimes spend months away from home, without their families and without a proper weekend or distance from their workplace, doing hard work without the opportunity for a spontaneous short holiday.

I keep a diary, including on social media. Still. I learn a lot, I see a lot and I develop a love for the bridge in the first of my 30 days on this ship. I quickly gained the confidence to move around the ship on my own. This also applies to the bridge at all times. I slowly get to grips with the rhythm of the watches and shifts, every post is filled redundantly, except mine, and yet I hardly care about sleep for the entire journey. After all, this ship never sleeps. The impressions just won't stop, and we haven't even left Europe behind us.

After "closing time" I can be found on the bridge of the container freighter

You can now usually find me on the bridge from midnight, after my photographic "closing time", where I sit for hours with the second officer Holger and he tells me everything about the ship and the business. He becomes my man of the voyage. We spend the night together and I sit in the co-pilot's seat, just like in an aeroplane. Anyone who thinks this is boring or monotonous is mistaken: the starry sky alone is priceless. "Our" shift ends around four o'clock, I sleep until eight o'clock, then breakfast is served and we meet up again on the bridge at noon - because that's when I'm allowed to sound the horn. One of the many routine technical tests on board.

When approaching the French harbour of Le Havre on the English Channel, the weather thwarts the pilot boat's plans. A helicopter is used instead. Nothing special for the crew, but madness for me. In the middle of the night, the experienced pilot sets the pilot down on our bridge dock using a winch - centimetre by centimetre. Apart from this one day, we were largely lucky with the weather on the whole trip - it did roll and storm a little at times, but all in all the sea was mild. On the other hand, a 300-metre ship can of course take more punishment than a motorboat. Nevertheless, the crew just said: "Be happy." They were probably also happy because the landlubber didn't get seasick and so the sick bay was only documented photographically.

After twelve days in the Atlantic, South America comes into view

Our course leads southwards: through the Bay of Biscay, past Portugal. It's getting warmer. We turn our backs on the German autumn. It's almost as if summer is returning. After a final stop in southern Spain, we pass through the impressive Strait of Gibraltar. And then the time has come: the Atlantic crossing is upon us, twelve days of nothing and nobody, not even social media. Almost 38 degrees outside temperature at the equator. With the permission of the ship's command, I decide to flood our on-board indoor pool with seawater and repair the net on the table tennis table. The crew is delighted.

The days at sea on board the container freighter pass by with exercises (such as fire alarms or man overboard), always the best food, extensive visits to the hot engine room, which takes your breath away in shape and size over several decks. Then there are the fantastic sunrises and sunsets, passing whale families, dolphins and passing container freighters from all over the world. Half time. As always, there is a party at the height of the equator, a big barbecue. There is no alcohol on board, 0.0 per cent. That's not a problem.

And then: land in sight: Brazil. After twelve days, we arrive in Santos, the harbour city off the coast of the São Paulo conurbation - it's strange to suddenly see birds again and then get up close and personal with a continent that I've never reached before and, above all, in such a decelerated way. I am also allowed to go on my first shore leave under certain conditions. Five signatures and three passport checks later, I'm sitting with the captain and some officers in a Brazilian beach bar with a non-alcoholic coconut cut live from a tree. Then off to the country's typical steakhouse. What an arrival.

Swap container freighter for hotel room

Over the next two weeks, the second half of the voyage, container freighter "Cap San Marco" will call at a number of other Brazilian ports before travelling to Montevideo in Uruguay. Then Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. Full of melancholy, I spend the last 48 hours together with "my boys", who not only realise my emotional state, but share it, before it's adios. The glow of the Buenos Aires skyline becomes visible at four o'clock in the morning and it's time to pack. Early in the morning, after little sleep, I sign out of the logbook and am allowed to leave a farewell message for everyone on the whiteboard, the board on which only the captain and senior officers are actually allowed to make entries - under the eyes of some crew members.

We are all built on the water. We quickly get off the ship. I hug the captain and officers goodbye - when we first met at the beginning of the journey, that would have been completely unthinkable, if only out of respect for the job. Now it's the respect that has created closeness. Then the management team returns on board and I spend my first night in the hotel, alone on the other side of the world for the first time in weeks... Fresh ashore, I find the hotel room and the life and noise of the big city very confining at first. But exciting. With a first can of beer on the bedside table, I try to let everything sink in for the moment. But the beer doesn't taste right, even after more than four weeks, not alone. I want to go home, on my container freighter ...

In the end, I carry my ship in my arms

From a fishing pier, I can at least follow the departure of the "Cap San Marco" the next morning. What happens next overwhelms me: although I look tiny next to the huge ship, the captain actually spots me with his binoculars and sounds his horn just for me. His deep tone reaches my tear ducts. I feel immensely honoured, because I know that a signal like that is not actually allowed here. Later, I realise that the captain had requested this special exception from the Port Authority. But there's more: afterwards, all the crew members who aren't at manoeuvring stations run on deck, waving, shouting and screaming.

One last escort. Because while I'm losing my ship, the others over there now have to do without their "First Photo Officer", as they christened me at the equator. A very emotional moment. Tears yes, sadness no. The experience was too great for that. I stay on the pier for a long time, but at some point even the huge "Cap San Marco" is so far away that I can barely make it out. Then I turn around and head towards the metropolis of millions, which should whet my appetite for another week. But as we all know, even the best dessert is hard to resist after a sensational main course. And so the two experiences are combined. A trip for life. Because as befits a true sailor, or rather a "sailor of the heart", I now wear my container freighter as a tattoo on my arm, engraved in the harbour district of Buenos Aires.

The ship

"Cap San Marco" (container ship of the Cap San class for the Hamburg Süd shipping company) - shipyard: Hyundai Heavy Industries (South Korea) - length: 333.20 m - width: 48.20 m - maximum draught: 14 m - maximum speed: 21 knots - engine: 1 x MAN B&W two-stroke diesel - power: 55,300 hp, container capacity: 9600 TEU (of which 2100 with reefer connection) - ships built in the class: 10

The shipping company

Hamburg Süd (exact name: Hamburg Süd-amerikanische Dampfschifffahrts-Gesellschaft; HSDG), based in Hamburg, is one of Germany's longest-established shipping companies. Since its foundation in 1871 for the transatlantic liner service, the company has constantly expanded its business segment and strengthened its market position. Since 2017, Hamburg Süd has been part of the world's largest container shipping company, the Danish Maersk Group, but continues to exist as its own brand. Its fleet currently comprises 700 ships. www.hamburgsud-line.com

The person

Before Phillip Gätz, born in Bielefeld in 1983, began his career as a photographer in Hamburg, there was another path ahead of him in 2010: as part of his photography degree, he completed a 1111-kilometre hike through Germany, his "Journey into the Mind", the predecessor to the "Journey into the Mind", as he called his latest adventure. Today, he works as a photographer for clients such as Beck's, Coca-Cola, Deutsche Bahn and Microsoft, as well as for magazines such as BOOTE, Men's Health, Rolling Stone and Spiegel.

The project

At the beginning of 2019, after a series of misfortunes and disappointments, Gätz just wants to get away - as far as possible - but not on foot again. He remembers his childhood dream: travelling around the world on a container ship. The idea is there, but the realisation is still a long way off. Months of research followed, with the development of social channels and a website. At the same time, he got partners like BOOTE, the outfitter Globetrotter and Olympus cameras on board to convince shipping companies and swap "pictures for berths". More months of rejections passed before things suddenly happened quickly: Hamburg Süd offered him the chance to go on a long voyage, from Hamburg to Buenos Aires. www.phillipgaetz.de , www.fahrtindenverstand.de

This article appeared in BOOTE issue 09/202o and was revised by the editorial team in December 2023.

This might also interest you:

• Seychelles - Flight to paradise
• On the Viking route across the North Atlantic
• Seaworthy motorboats - Once across the Atlantic
• LEEN 72: Boat owner on Atlantic crossing with trimaran