Ferry Line F24

Berlin might be the last place one would expect to find a rowboat serving as public transportation. However, one still exists in the city’s suburb of Rahnsdorf. The only scheduled rowboat transit in all of Germany, it has carried passengers across the Müggelspree River since 1911.

The service was first started by local hatmaker Richard Hilliges, in response to visitors inquiring how to cross the river. It eventually became such a fixture of the area that it was taken over by BVG, Berlin's transit authority, in 1947. When they cut the service in 2013, 18,000 locals signed a petition in protest, and it was reinstated two years later.

Today, the ferryman Marcel Franke makes the 36-meter (about 120 feet) journey across the river in about 12 strokes, approximately 40 times a day. The plastic vessel, the Paule III, is named after a beloved former ferryman and can seat just eight passengers.