Gustav Andresen, a former ship's cook, initially struggles as a restaurant owner, but eventually puts down roots near the Brunsbüttel canal lock. The young sailor's widow Yvonne Bröhan has successfully completed radio school in Hamburg and embarks on her first voyage as a radio operator. Chally Tonzel, who has replaced Gustav as the ship's cook, is faced with the difficult choice of which of three equally attractive sisters he should marry. Lore, now the wife of the Dutch owner of the Kümo, Henk van der Meyden, knows how to assert her rights on board against her mother-in-law.

Sculptor Max Kolbe has rented a room with the Käselau family as a "furnished gentleman" to escape his love-struck bride and to work in peace for an exhibition. But he is not safe from anything in this tenement: the women's lives seem to be dominated by gossip, curiosity and envy. But the men are no better! Kolbe's false name and his actions arouse the strongest suspicions in the house: why doesn't he go to work? Is he doing shady business? What are the young ladies looking for with him?