Bremerhaven (Bremen, Germany)

Bremerhaven is a major North Sea port and the cruise port to Bremen City (riverport). Bremerhaven is located on the east side of Weser River Estuary (Germany's North Sea / Baltic Sea coast). The seaport was established in 1827 as cargo port for Freie Hansestadt Bremen (Free Hanseatic City of Bremen / Germany's smallest state) to the south (located approx 50 km / 30 ml downstream Weser River). Train travel time from Bremerhaven to Hamburg is 1 hour 45 min. Road distance (via highways A1 and A27) is 95 km (59 ml).

Port Bremerhaven is ranked world's 16th-largest and Europe's 4th-largest containership port - with annual capacity over 5 million TEU-containers. Port's annual Ro-Ro traffic includes over 1,35 million new cars (imported and exported), surpassed only by Rotterdam Holland. A new Panamax-sized lock was opened in 2011, replacing the 1897-built Kaiserschleuse - back then world's biggest lock. Bremerhaven is ranked Europe's largest car export port (after Zeebrugge and Emden).

In 2017, for the first time Costa Cruises used Bremerhaven as homeport (departures on roundtrip itineraries) for Costa Magica, with scheduled 11 partial turnarounds. Other major cruise companies homeporting here include TUI, Phoenix Reisen, Transocean Tours.

In 2018, the cruise port reported a record season with handled 111 ship calls and around 230,000 passengers, which was 45% increase over 2017. Maiden calls in 2018 included the liners Norwegian Bliss, Mein Schiff 1, AIDAnova, Marella Discovery, Costa Mediterranea, Seabourn Ovation, Azamara Journey. In 2018, the port introduced new "cruise parking" packages, with optional pre-booking and luggage collection service from the vehicle. For 2019, the port has booked 120 ship calls and expects around 260,000 cruise passengers.

As cruise port, Bremerhaven has total quay length 1 km and capacity to berth vessels with LOA length 350 m (1148 ft) and max draft 10 m (33 ft). The seaport has modern passenger terminal (Columbus Cruise Center) and good infrastructure with connections to highways and railways.

Bremerhaven cruise terminal