Wolf Kaiser
A seasoned captain with 40 years at sea and countless stories to tell.
Captain, author and artistic soul: Wolf Kaiser has a wide range of skills. Here, he looks back on his 40 years at sea – and shares how to create sculptures using nothing more than toilet paper and wood glue.
Seafarers tend to have long and eventful lives, so it’s hard to know where to start their stories. This is especially true in the case of Captain Wolf Kaiser. Perhaps we should start with his period as an ordinary seaman in the former East Germany and the maiden voyage he took to Cuba? Or with his love of cooking and how he later taught many ship cooks how to make classic German dishes? Or maybe with a potential stabbing on board? Though all his stories can’t be told here, they can be found in “Klor bi Anker,” Kaiser’s multi-volume memoirs.
The beginnings: close to the water, far into the distance
“My earliest encounter with seafaring was with my grandfather, who had been a captain with the so-called White Fleet in Berlin,” Kaiser says. “I was five years old and visited him often.” A bit over 10 years later, there came a day when he was standing with a friend in front of the large world map in a classroom. They looked at the oceans and the continents, and read exotic names like Surabaya, Jakarta and Singapore. “That’s when we really got the itch to travel,” the captain recounts.
Kaiser’s training years began on the “Georg Büchner,” a cargo and training vessel owned by the Rostock-based Deutsche See Reederei (DSR), the national shipping line of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). “I will never forget our first voyage to Cuba. After being at sea for 14 days, we saw the Azores for the first time.” The young man never felt the pangs of homesickness. On the contrary, he fell in love with a Cuban woman and enjoyed spending his time off on the beach of Havanna.
At the time, he didn’t give any thought to becoming a chief mate or even a captain. “All that responsibility? I couldn’t imagine it!” Kaiser says. But with time came experience, and the sometimes rebellious apprentice became a seasoned seaman. “And then you suddenly say to yourself: ‘Man, I can do that!’” he says. Before long, he had completed his studies and become a third and then a second officer.
And then you suddenly say to yourself: ‘Man, I can do that!’
Wolf at the seaport of Rostock talking about his beginnings in seafaring.
The path to Hamburg, and how to prevent a stabbing
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 marked a new chapter in Kaiser’s life. “In the fall of 1989, we were sailing on the ‘Erst Moritz Arndt’ to Cuba,” he recounts. “When the radio operator told us that the Wall had fallen, we could hardly believe it.” Kaiser makes no secret of the fact that he was deeply shocked by Germany’s reunification. “I needed a few years to process it,” he says. “After all, I had once believed in the GDR, even though the party had lost some credibility over time in my eyes, too.”
As a young DSR officer who was married but had no children, Kaiser was near the top of the list of those who would be let go. After submitting job applications to roughly 30 shipping companies, he was hired by a Hamburg-based charter shipping company. This was followed by voyages around the world on container ships and freighters known as “banana hunters,” and he would earn his captain’s stripes in 1997.
When asked about his writing, Wolf Kaiser says,
“I feel like I’ve always been writing, but writing did really help me a lot as a captain."
At that time, he also recorded details about an attempted stabbing, writing: “We were sailing in the Caribbean. One of the seafarers on watch duty neglected his duties, thereby risking considerable damage to the engine. As one would expect, this led to an official entry in the ship’s log. That night, I suddenly heard a wild banging on the wall, so I went out to see what was going on. There in the corridor stood the seafarer who had gotten the reprimand. He had a crazed look in his eyes and a long knife in his hand, which he was using to bust his way through the door to the chief engineer’s quarters. I was eventually able to subdue him with pepper spray. I probably saved the chief engineer’s life.”
Switch to Hapag-Lloyd? What a great idea!
Some 15 years later, Kaiser started working for Hapag-Lloyd. But that wasn’t the end of his adventures. “We were sailing on the ‘London Express’ on the Pacific, heading from Asia toward Seattle and San Francisco,” he recounts. “The first low was so inauspicious that we had to change course and sail up along the Kuriles before we dared to make the leap over to the Aleutian Islands. But then a second powerful low started forming to the south of us, so I decided to stop the ship. During this stop, we discovered that the main engine had a broken cylinder head, which called for a demanding and, above all, lengthy repair. At around midnight, I warmed up two tins of sausages and brought them to the hard-working engineers. They were completely flabbergasted, as they’d never had a captain bring them a snack!”
A pulmonary disease put the otherwise robust captain out of action in 2013.
“But I fought my way back to health, and today I’m grateful not only to my wife and a few smart doctors, but also Hapag-Lloyd, for their fantastic support.”
In November 2014, the fully rehabilitated captain took command of the “Rotterdam Express”, a container ship. If you ask him today what advice he gives to young colleagues, his answer is unambiguous: “If something fills you with burning passion, go for it. Then, instead of seeing problems, you will see only challenges that will enable you to grow!”
Somehow, the sea just won’t let me go – or I won’t let it go!
When asked about the story involving the sculptures made out of Korean toilet paper and Mexican wood glue, Kaiser says: “We had both on board when we were sailing on the container ship the ‘Düsseldorf Express’ from Mexico to Japan. And since I prefer to make something instead of drinking beer in the evening, I mixed the two together.” Kaiser then points to the result on the window sill: an impressive sculpture of an exotic sawfish.
Since retiring, the captain has had time to devote himself fully to his artistic side. And he and his wife like to travel across Europe in their camper van. “We prefer to go to places with lots of water, especially islands,” he says.
Discover more of our New Horizons stories
Underway
From rickshaws to regional trains—these stories show how our colleagues around the world make their way to work, one commute at a time.
Holding Course
Through detours, delays, and determination - Captain Robert Fronczak's path to new horizons and solid ground.
A Quest for Quality
Join Luise Jacobs and Pia Dabelstein by unveiling the secret of quality and technology at Hapag-Lloyd.
"A Clean Ship is a Happy Ship"
How grooming technology is literally shaving emissions off Hapag-Lloyd’s fleet – keeping it clean and green.
On Art and the Algorithm of Happiness
Following the unique route of Ijeoma Nwoke from Lagos, via Aberdeen to Hapag-Lloyd in Hamburg.
Beyond the Helm
In this series, it’s the crew who take the lead – sharing their own glimpses into everyday maritime life.
Your Photos
From portside sunsets to open-sea snapshots: These are the images that caught our colleagues’ eyes. Take a look through their lens.
Catch of the Month
Feeling hungry? Our colleagues opened their kitchens to share dishes with a special connection to their homes. Discover what’s cooking.
New Edition
Stay tuned! Our brand-new edition of Logbook, coming in August 2025, is waiting just on the horizon.