About ten years ago I rode along with a friend of mine who was part of that program. He had a 43' ketch. We loaded up supplies from a yacht club at "Horseshoe Cove", which is at the base of the north tower of the Golden Gate Bridge.
The conditions were awful. We were supposed to go out Saturday but the conditions were just too bad. We waited until early Sunday morning and headed out. Facing a headwind he decided to motor all the way.
There is no dock or even a protected bay out at the island. There is a mooring that you can tie up to in the lee of the island. They have a large fixed crane that they use to lower a boston whaler type boat a couple hundred feet down the cliff face. The small boat then comes over to the delivery boat and gear/people transfer.
Normally they will invite the deliver crew to come onto the island and give them a tour. In our case it was so rough that transfering to the Boston Whaler would have been fairly risky. The weather was deteriorating and we were about four hours from the gate so we just transfered the supplies and headed back.
It was a long, cold, wet day.
I would do it again in a heartbeat! I would dress warmer and have better foul weather gear, however.
I am not sure but I do not believe that they reimburse for expenses. Most of the delivery boats are sail. At the time I owned a 36' Carver and my friend was trying to recruit me saying that they could really use a boat like mine for carrying the larger items out to the island.
If you have a suitable boat, can handle the weather and ocean conditons and don't mind the expense then I highly recommend it.
Rod
