Mermaid (ship, 1875)
 Steamer Dora (ex. Nixe ) in Havelberg, picture postcard from around 1968
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The Nixe is a historic steamship that was in operation until 1968 and is currently being restored (as of 2018). Should it be put back into operation as planned, it would be one of the oldest active steamers in Germany.
history
The Nixe was built in 1875 at the Reiherstieg shipyard in Hamburg-Wilhelmsburg as the first tugboat for operation on the Alster in Hamburg and put into service under the name Biene . In 1902 the ship was lengthened by the installation of a middle section, converted into a passenger ship and now sailed under the name Nixe . In March 1923 the ship was sold to a scrapping yard in Warnemünde . The ship, however, was not scrapped, but reached Zehdenick in the Uckermark and was used for trips to Berlin under the name Gilda .
In 1942, the skipper Wilhelm Fahrenberg bought the ship, named it after his wife Dora and used it in Magdeburg for trips to the Rothensee ship lift . In 1944 the Dora was badly damaged in a bomb attack. Fahrberg had it repaired in a makeshift manner and transferred it to Rathenow . Towards the end of the Second World War , the ship was used to transport the wounded. After the end of the war, Fahrenberg obtained the clearance of the Dora , which initially carried out salvage work on behalf of the Red Army . Afterwards, Fahrenberg used the ship in regular service between Rathenow, Havelberg and Berlin-Spandau . The traffic to Spandau had to be stopped as a result of the construction of the wall , and in the early 1960s the regular traffic between Havelberg and Rathenow had to be stopped. The line from Havelberg to Garz continued to be served, and excursions were also carried out. In 1968 the ship was decommissioned because the now 74-year-old Wilhelm Fahrenberg was no longer in a position to continue operations. In 1969 the ship was towed ashore by chain tugs of the Soviet army and initially served as an excursion restaurant, after the fall of the Wall as a brothel .
The ship had been empty since 2006 and was falling into disrepair. In 2010 the Hamburg association Alsterdampfschifffahrt acquired the ship and wanted to restore it at the Laubegast shipyard in Dresden . After their bankruptcy, the sandblasted hull was brought to the Hitzler shipyard in Lauenburg / Elbe in June 2013 . After the restoration, the steamer will be used again as a museum ship on the Alster under the name Nixe . It would then be the oldest active passenger steamship in Germany and a year older than the St. Georg, which is also operated by the Alsterdampfschifffahrt association . The restoration should cost around 400,000 euros.