How do you send out a search party?

[TowerWizard]

Read somewhere that the ship jas to have the required goods, be "at the island" and then stop moving, so that a spinning telescope icon will appear over the ship. I have moved with the goods to several islands and even tried to build warehouses at them, to no avail.

Can someone say exactly what I must do to make this work?

[Sphinx]

Sail your ship with necessary goods next to the island and it will start searching. Wait a little and you'll have a result.

Works same way with creating maps.