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Hamburg
Hamburg
Harbour Cruise
The million city in the north is not only home to the largest seaport and the most famous entertainment district in Germany, but also a diverse and traditional motorcycle scene. Especially around the port
Thomas Quast
01/26/1998
“Always along the dike and then to the parking lot at the Luhebrucke”, the Transalp pilot in Finkenwerder on the Lower Elbe had declared, “there is always motorcycle meeting on Sundays.” Behind Borstel in the Altes Land, where the Luhe flows into the broad Elbe river , I turn over the dike to the ferry dock. In fact, I find a small group of motorcyclists stretched out in the sun on the grassy bank, watching cruising sailing ships and a slowly passing freighter. Hamburg is closer than the idyllic excursion suggests. A passenger ferry is currently crossing to Schulau, a neighboring town of Blankenese, Hamburg’s number one posh district. A number of other bikers are grouped around a few snack bars, licking ice cream, chewing fish rolls or sausage, drinking beer or rather soda: the leather lace-up jeans, the racing skins, the classic black leather coats, the denim robes, the adventure-promising enduro jackets, the sensible ones, Functional touring suits, the muscle shirts. A superbike rolls by, the driver in racing suit, the pillion in a protector-free mini-skirt. Jewelry flashes on some hands and on some chest hair, and skin decorated with tattoos is sometimes displayed. Who belongs on which moped? The rate palette ranges from the razor-sharp rat bike to the brutal street fighter to the nervously groaning noble racer, from the rock-solid everyday striker to gleaming chrome deck chairs to the design award-winning custom bike. Interested, I lean over the checkered flag airbrush on the fender of a silver-gray Harley-Cafe Racer – just don’t mess with the ice now. A young Turkish woman with a headscarf in a cool spider web and skull design rounds off the casual togetherness of the bikers Worldviews. A Ducati driver dressed in green, white and red to match his beautiful Italian tells about the motorcycle meeting at the Zollenspieker Fahrhaus and recommends going there. There would be more going on at the Sternschanze in the city, but unfortunately you only meet there every third Sunday morning. For at least 22 years. But not today – it’s a shame: the way to the Zollenspieker upstream from the Elbe is even more idyllic than the one to Luhe. Unfortunately, the Elbe ferry from Hopte to Zollenspieker has already closed. »Sa. and Sun. 8.30 a.m. – 7.00 p.m. «it is written on the landing stage. A Guzzi V 7, also arriving too late, guides me via Geesthacht to the aforementioned motorcycle meeting point. But here it will also soon be over and out. The last remaining people reveal that the Zollenspieker Fahrhaus is a better address for motorcyclists during the week than it is today on Sunday. Kai, on the way on an already badly shredded XT 500, advises driving back to Hamburg through the free port, that would be great. Sounds good. In the last evening light, the city of 1.7 million people presents a truly impressive skyline: an idiosyncratic composition of steel loading cranes, container terminals, lighting masts, bridges and ship superstructures shines in a strange romance against the purple-red sky. Behind it, on the north bank of the Elbe, stretch the old towers of the city, above all the 132-meter-high “Michel”, the city’s landmark. At the front, the light from countless floodlights is reflected in the harbor basin. The largest German seaport covers 91 square kilometers, more than twelve percent of the city’s area. Around 140,000 Hanseatic people live directly or indirectly from this gigantic trading center. And although the North Sea is more than 100 kilometers down the Elbe and the Baltic Sea around 60 kilometers to the northeast, this is Germany’s furthest gateway to the world’s oceans. A trip over the Kohlbrand Bridge offers a breathtaking overview. Supported on only two pylons, it swings in a bold arc four kilometers over the harbor and the southern Elbe, artfully balanced by radial steel cables. For today I leave the labyrinth of harbor basins, canals, quays and docks, pass nostalgic steel lattice bridges and toll houses – the free port is considered a foreign country, or customs foreign country more precisely – to get into the nightlife in St. Pauli and Altona. And that is not only long and longer on the Reeperbahn at half past twelve thousand meters. In Altona you can watch the cruising moped colleagues in the airy, urban outdoor ambience and dine well and much cheaper until late at night than in the relevant posh restaurants and manger in the tourist “in” and “must” districts. And that is exactly what is hip on a mild summer night like this: If the Reeperbahn in its flashing neon nightgown may still arouse interest, disillusionment follows during the day. When I roll over it in the bright sunshine the next morning, there are only shabby, cheap facades and dingy house entrances to look at. A couple of aged-looking figures squeeze into the doorways, beer bottles stick out of the garbage cans. In Thadenstrasse, a black Guzzi V 7 850 GT tempts me to stop in front of the Riders Room motorcycle shop. The owner of the V 7, which is apparently quite popular in Hamburg, is also assisting a young woman who is changing the chain of her SR 500 in a black ribbed mini dress and platform docs. A self-painted cardboard number plate hangs boldly on the rear of the machine. “That’s enough for the short way here, I don’t want to register until later,” explains owner Ane casually. Inside, an extensive collection of classic bike wear is more reminiscent of the Hamburg image of the shopping metropolis. If it weren’t for the young guy who is doing an oil change on an old Norton Commando on the natural ship plank floor. In addition to Guzzi V7, the Hanseatic League also has a weakness for everything British. The previously notorious rocker scene in St. Pauli, which was mainly equipped with older Harley Davidsons, has now given way to much more harmless contemporaries. A little further up Thadenstrasse, in the sales rooms of the Motor Station Altona, which specializes in Harley tuning, there are well-tended banks and they can be instructed about the feasible decibels of the individually styled Milwaukee Twins on display there. “My buddy has entered 102 Phon, does that work with them too?” Angry blasts until the row house shakes, but with TuV, please. The scene is somewhat reminiscent of a Holger Aue comic. Presumably he gets some suggestions here, because he lives around the corner. The nice, unpretentious Harley screwdrivers take it north German calmly and correct the all too unabashedly used Harley cliche. A visit to the St. Pauli Landungsbrucken is part of every Hamburg tourist program. From the high bow of the museum freighter Cap San Diego at the uberseebrucke, you can see the bright sandstone building with its greenish-colored domes on the banks of the Elbe lying in the sun through the white mast structures of the Rickmer Rickmers windjammer. In the background, the graffiti-adorned houses on Hafenstrasse glow – almost a tourist attraction. Unfortunately there is not enough time for a tour of the harbor by boat. I would have loved to see the old brick houses of the old warehouse district, which can only be reached by water. The old Elbe tunnel branches off to the right of the landing stages. But that has to be the case now. One of four cage-like lattice elevators can be used to get into the tunnel. After I’ve maneuvered the Kawasaki into it, we both float down inside a domed hall with cantilevered steel stairs, which looks like a cathedral with its high broken-glass windows. The elevator gates open below, and two 400-meter-long, yellow-tiled tunnel tubes lie in front of us, pale-lit by thick-glazed neon tubes. I drive under the Elbe at a speed of 20 km / h. Impressive and scary at the same time. Gray wall reliefs pass right and left, one shows a rat dancing with her buddies through a boot that is soaked in the water. Somewhere high-heeled steps clatter through the tunnel. On the Steinwerder side, the wire basket elevator lifts me outside again. Unfortunately, the domed hall, which was destroyed in the war, was later replaced by a secular low-rise building. The elevator ride is only half as exciting – time for a break. Through the now somewhat familiar harbor, I make my way to the Oberhafenbrucke. There is the little brick house that houses the “Oberhafenkantine”. As a filming location for many a crime thriller, from “Stahlnetz” to “Tatort”, it is already a small place of worship. For food, however, I opt for the port workers ‘and trucker bar “Zum Trucker” a little further, with FC St. Pauli fans’ corner and everything that goes with it. There are fried potatoes with pickled meat. Good, typically northern German and cheap too. Through the city, the ZZ-R and I make our way back to Altona. On the shoulder blade in the Schanzenviertel is the old Flora Theater, which has been occupied since 1989 and now functions as a non-commercial district center Rote-Flora. A red-painted wreck of an old Yamaha is welded on over the entrance to the courtyard. Behind it resides the motorcycle self-help group Rote Flora with its workshop and a meeting point. A couple of the “autonomous screwdrivers” are just there, taking care of the collapsed alternator of an old BMW R 90 S. A Honda XL 500 is leaning against the wall next to a lonely rose bush struggling to survive, an old 750 Triumph Bonneville is on the workbench the surprisingly well-organized workshop. After initial mistrust, Franz, Jorg, Uli and Frank engage in a conversation, the photographer’s unusual Aprilia Moto 6.5 forms the contact bridge, they like it. Soon they will tell about their project. “We see ourselves in the tradition of the workers’ self-help associations of the 1920s,” explains Frank, whoever wants can screw here. Also from outsiders who need help. Donations are then welcome, because this is how the group finances itself. A very different kind of political self-image is represented by the so-called Pfiffigunde in Ottensen. It is a purely women’s motorcycle workshop, which I should definitely get to know on the advice of the Rote Flora mechanics. In Hohenesch on the border between Altona and Ottensen I find them, the »Auto-, Motorrad & Metal self-help for women “Pfiffigunde”, as the name goes in full. Unfortunately, as a non-woman, I am not allowed to enter the self-help workshop, which looks very generous and well-equipped from the outside. But on the farm that Pfiffigunde shares with the MZ and Simson specialist Ingolf Koster, Claudia, the company’s metal specialist, briefly tells me about her work. In addition to motorcycle and car self-help, the Pfiffigunde offers screwdriver and metalworking courses for interested women. The goal of Pfiffigunde is to create opportunities for women where they can work undisturbed on their vehicles, rely on competent guidance and help with repair problems and receive additional training. And which woman – but also some men – does not know the situation in which a man, according to the motto “let me know, little one”, does a repair right away, although only one detail had to be clarified. Which is then of no use to women if they want to repair their bike themselves. I end my Hamburg trip in the Strandperle near Ottensen. I have enough food for thought. The Strandperle is actually just a perfectly normal kiosk, located on a small strip of Elbe beach, between industrial halls on the left and rich residential areas on the right. Still a place where a mixed crowd with and without a motorcycle can be found on beautiful summer evenings. One last time I look at the container terminals, the Kohlbrand Bridge, a huge steamer from Venezuela that is slowly passing by. Hamburg – somehow here is really the gateway to the world.
info
There is a lot to discover for motorcyclists around the port of Hamburg. Not just the port and ships, but the pure motorcycle scene. Even Honda moved into its very first quarters in Germany in Wandalen there xx years ago.
Arrival: From the south and north, the A 1 (Bremen – Lubeck) or the A 7 (Hanover – Flensburg) lead right into the heart of the Hanseatic city. The A 24 is recommended from the east: The Elbe metropolis offers a variety of overnight accommodations for every taste and budget. A “city surcharge” must of course always be taken into account for Hamburg. Those who love it classy can stay at the Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten (double rooms from 456 marks; Neuer Jungfernsteg 9-14, phone 040/34940). You are good, inexpensive and, above all, centrally located in the Hotel Pacific (double room from 100 marks); New horse market 30-31, phone 040/4395095. Alternatives are private quarters or youth hostels (Alfred-Wegener-Weg 5, 040/313488 and Rennbahnstrabe 100, phone 040/6511671 and, for longer stays, the Mitwohnzentrale, phone 040/4206619. In summer you can even camp: Campingplatz City Camp, Kieler Strabe 650 , Telephone 040/5704498. Two people with a tent and a motorcycle pay 25 Marks there. Motorcycle meeting: The most famous motorcycle meeting is the Sternschanzentreffen, at the said Sternschanze, north of St. Pauli. The nearby television tower provides a good orientation aid. Every third Sunday all year round This meeting takes place in the morning. If 800 to 1000 bikers come in summer, in winter there are maybe 50 ice saints who meet here to chat. The meeting at the Luhebrucke ferry terminal near Borstel is easy to find when you are in Hamburg through the harbor hits the southern side of the Elbe and then from Finkenwerder always follows the Elbe dike through the Alte Land to the northwest in the direction of Stade Elvish in the east, in the direction of Geesthacht, the Zollenspieker Fahrhaus is located on the Elbe ferry Zollenspieker-Hopte. There is usually something going on here, even during the week. Occasionally this motorcycle meeting moves a few dike curves further forward. The numerous, often brand and type-oriented regulars’ tables, because of the medium-term change of location, are better based on the regional motorcycle press (the magazines are available in most motorcycle shops). Gastronomy and entertainment : Altona and St. Pauli are the quarters in which nighttime leisure time fun is concentrated beyond the Reeperbahn. Here you can dine cheaply and often in nice surroundings, mostly outside in summer. Why it seems so damn typical port-like for the landlocked in workers’ harbor bars like “Zum Trucker” or the famous “Oberhafenkantine” on Stockmeyerstrabe, between Oberhafenbrucke quays and warehouses, with Labskaus or Sauerfleisch, can hardly be rationally explained or explained. Therefore only one thing helps: try it out. The world-bound “seaport feeling” is easiest to get in between Easter and the end of September in the “Strandperle” on Schulberg. Info & Literature: Tourist Information at the harbor (between bridge 4 and 5 of the Landungsbrucken, phone 040/30051203); Jorg Albrecht’s Marco Polo travel guide Hamburg for 9.80 Marks has proven itself as a brief information and to get to know each other & Metal self-help Pfiffigunde; Hohenesch 70, 22765 Hamburg, phone 040/3902578, motorcycle self-help group Rote Flora; Shoulder blade 71, 20357 Hamburg, (no phone.) Riders Room; Thadenstrasse 4, 22767 Hamburg, 040/4308836
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