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Alcatraz Boat Tour
There are two very different ways to visit Alcatraz via ferry tours from two different companies, and each trip is both fun and informative:
1. Take an Alcatraz boat tour cruise around the island without leaving the boat, with a recorded audio program explaining in detail all the features you can see from the water (the subject of this page). This lets you see parts of the island and prison you can’t readily see from land.
Insiders Tip: During the summer there is also a new 2-hour Alcatraz and Golden Gate Bridge narrated tour that sails once a day from Tiburon. We have more information in the next section below.
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2. Take a ferry to the island, disembark and walk around the gardens and go inside the old prison. This option puts you on the island and (if you wish) inside the abandoned prison. Reaching the top level of the island complex requires either a steep walk up the hill (it’s the height of a 13-story building) or a tram ride. (Click here for our page about buying tickets for this trip.) This ferry trip to the island takes 15 minutes in each direction and is the best choice for those who might get seasick easily on a longer trip, even in the more sheltered waters of the Bay (like one of our editors!).
If going inside the old prison sounds like fun, the walk around the island option is best for you, and you can click here to read about it. If you like seeing the rugged island and the exterior views of the prison that can’t be seen when you’re walkiing around on land, the extended cruise will be better and the information on this page will be useful.
Insiders Tip: There are a number of companies that offer different tours of San Francisco Bay with different routes and durations whose boats sail past Alcatraz as part of the trip. They do not have the same extended visit time and dramatic narration of the history of the prison as the tours described below, but are a good choice for getting to see a variety of locations around the Bay. If you’re not focused on Alcatraz alone they may be a better bet.
Insiders Tip: Both of the Sausalito ferries cruise past Alcatraz as they travel between Sausalito and San Francisco, although they do not stop there. This is another option for seeing Alcatraz from the water if you also want to visit Sausalito for lunch.
The New Alcatraz Boat Tour with the Golden Gate Bridge
I mentioned above that there are tours of San Francisco Bay that cruise past Alcatraz as they show you many landmarks in the Bay Area. There is also a dedicated Alcatraz boat tour (described in detail below) that focuses on just one landmark.
There is a compromise choice: a combined 2-hour Alcatraz boat tour and Golden Gate Bridge tour that goes beneath the Bridge. This narrated tour that gives you a close-up view of our two most famous landmarks on San Francisco Bay. This tour is available only during the summer, but those are the months when the Alcatraz park visit tickets are sold out long in advance.
The tour departs from Tiburon in Marin County (from the Angel Island Ferry pier), and there is just one sailing each day at 2:30 PM. It’s offered from June 17 through September 30, Their website and link to buy tickets is here.
The Narrated Alcatraz Tour
Blue and Gold Fleet (which also operates some of the Sausalito ferries and Tiburon ferries) offers a 90-minute Alcatraz boat tour from their San Francisco headquarters at Pier 41 / Pier 39 in Fisherman’s Wharf. They call it “Escape from the Rock” and it goes around the island twice as well as going under the Golden Gate Bridge and back.
The tour takes 90 minutes and they have a recorded narration thst covers the history of the island and prison in a dramatic “History Channel style” audio program called “Escape from the Rock.”
Ticket prices for the Escape from the Rock tour are:
To buy tickets online for “Escape from the Rock” from Blue and Gold Fleet, click here.
Insiders Tip: Pier 39 at Fisherman’s Wharf has a big but expensive parking garage, and Blue and Gold Fleet does not validate parking. But the high-end restaurants at Pier 39 do validate, so if you have a meal (also expensive) here along with your Alcatraz cruise you’ll at least get a break on your parking!
We have more information about parking in the area here.
Alcatraz Tour Schedule (Cruise Around Island)
The page with the updated schedules for this cruise is located here.
On the satellite image below you can see Alcatraz and a tour boat at the left that is about to go by the island. If you zoom in you’ll see the dock, which is at the right (eastern) edge of Alcatraz in this image.
