The small Berlin shipping company Wünsche is a real family business: Together with her daughter Claudia and her husband Mario, Astrid Wünsche has been offering sightseeing tours through the canals of the capital for many years. Astrid's divorced husband Uwe, with whom she still gets on well despite a painful separation, takes care of the on-board catering and runs a small gourmet restaurant on one of the landing stages. The desires do not yet suspect that dark clouds are brewing over their little idyll: A major American shipping company is pushing into the Berlin market, and top manager Albert Marquard is right with any means to secure a supremacy for the group. With "donations" and "favors" he attracts politicians and committees to his side. Marquard is particularly interested in the route that Astrid covers with her excursion boat. He takes part in one of her tours incognito - and immediately takes a liking to the charming and confident shipowner.