River Clyde

The Firth of Clyde is the mouth of the River Clyde. It is located on the west coast of Scotland and constitutes the deepest coastal waters in the British Isles (it is 164 metres deep at its deepest). The firth is sheltered from the Atlantic Ocean by the Kintyre peninsula, which encloses the outer firth in Argyll and Ayrshire. The Kilbrannan Sound is a large arm of the Firth of Clyde, separating the Kintyre Peninsula from the Isle of Arran. Within the Firth of Clyde is another major island – the Isle of Bute. Given its strategic location at the entrance to the middle and upper Clyde, Bute played a vital naval military role during World War II.

Little Cumbrae (Scots: Wee Cumbrae, Scottish Gaelic: Cumaradh Beag) or Little Cumbrae Island is an island in the Firth of Clyde, in North Ayrshire, Scotland. The island is known locally as Wee Cumbrae.

Castle Island (Scottish Gaelic: Eilean a' Chaisteil) or Allimturrail is a small tidal island, lying off the east coast of Little Cumbrae, and to the west of Trail Island, in the Firth of Clyde. It is joined to Little Cumbrae at low tide. The castle which gives the island its name was built in 1527, and was destroyed by Cromwellian forces in 1650. It is a square keep, and is said to have been built originally to prevent deer poaching.

Portencross Castle, also known historically as Portincross Castle, is situated in Portencross, on the west coast of Scotland, about 3 km from West Kilbride. The site has been fortified since the 11th Century. The present tower castle is thought to date from the mid-14th Century and later. It remained in use until it was unroofed by a great storm in 1739 and gradually became ruinous. The castle was designated as a scheduled ancient monument in 1955.The castle was one of the buildings featured in the 2004 series of the BBC television programme Restoration and was the subject of efforts by a local community group to secure its future.

North Ayrshire and Arran is a constituency of the British House of Commons, located in the south-west of Scotland within the North Ayrshire council area. It elects one Member of Parliament (MP) at least once every five years using the first-past-the-post voting system of voting. Once a longtime Conservative seat, the area had been represented by Labour MPs from 1987 until 2015. Patricia Gibson, has held the seat as an SNP member since 2015. It contains the towns of Largs, Fairlie and West Kilbride to the north, as well as the towns of Ardrossan, Kilbirnie, the Garnock Valley, Kilwinning, Saltcoats and Stevenston to the south. The Isle of Arran and Great Cumbrae are also within the constituency.

Mary Speir Gunn (31 August 1862 – 18 October 1913) was murdered in a shooting attack at the isolated Northbank Cottage near Portencross in North Ayrshire, Scotland on the evening of Saturday, 18 October 1913. Six shots were fired through the living-room window at night. Three shots struck Mary Gunn, the fatal one piercing her heart. Two shots hit her sister Jessie McLaren, who collapsed with a bullet lodged in her back, but she survived the attack. Jessie's husband, Alexander McLaren, was injured in the index finger of his left hand.Newspapers described the murder at the time as "a terrible and most mysterious tragedy". Nobody was charged or prosecuted for the crime, which remains an unsolved murder.

Portencross (Scottish Gaelic: Port na Crois) is a hamlet near Farland Head in North Ayrshire, Scotland. Situated about three kilometres (two miles) west of Seamill and about two kilometres (1+1⁄4 miles) south of Hunterston B nuclear power station, it is noted for Portencross Castle. It has two harbours and a pier. The "Old Harbour" is actually a small tidal inlet next to the castle, and is part of the castle property. The larger harbour, "North Harbour", owned by the Portencross Harbour Trust, lies about 100 m (110 yd) north of the castle and was the main access point for fishing activity.The Portencross Pier was built in the era of Clyde steamer cruising but was never used as much as other locations such as Largs, Fairlie or Wemyss Bay.

Kelspoke Castle is a ruined castle overlooking Kilchattan Bay, Isle of Bute, Scotland. Only a small amount of the ruins are above ground.

The Holy Cave at Hunterston in the Parish of West Kilbride is associated with Saint Mungo, also known as St Kentigern and is often referred to as the Hawking Craig Cave however two caves exists in the Hawking Craig Wood and 'Three Sisters' area of the cliffs, the other being Smith's Cave, better described as a rock shelter lying a short distance to the south. The main cave has been excavated and the finds indicate three periods of occupation over many centuries.

Strathclyde (Ystrad Clud in Northern Brittonic; Srath Chluaidh [s̪t̪ɾa ˈxl̪ˠɯi] in Gaelic, meaning "strath (valley) of the River Clyde") was one of nine former local government regions of Scotland created in 1975 by the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 and abolished in 1996 by the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994. The Strathclyde region had 19 districts. The region was named after the early medieval Kingdom of Strathclyde centred on Govan, but covered a broader geographic area than its namesake.

The Eileans are two small, low-lying islands located in Newtown Bay, Millport on the island of Great Cumbrae, Scotland. (grid reference NS164545). The name is an anglicisation of the Scottish Gaelic, eilean meaning "island". Unusually for the west coast of Scotland, the two islands appear to have no individual names of their own and as such are always referred to collectively. The islands were mined for stone in the Victorian times, during the busy expansion of Millport. Today the islands are home to a small colony of harbour seals. Three smaller rocks, the Leug (possibly Gaelic: gemstone), the Spoig (Gaelic: paw) and the Clach (Gaelic: stone) lie to the west.

Millport (Scottish Gaelic: Port a' Mhuilinn) is the only town on the island of Great Cumbrae in the Firth of Clyde off the coast of mainland Scotland, in the council area of North Ayrshire. The town is 4 miles (6 km) south of the ferry terminal that links the island to the Scottish mainland. Due to its small size, the island and its town are often linked in the minds of visitors and residents and Cumbrae is often referred to as Millport. The island offers views across to the Isle of Arran as well as of its smaller neighbour which lies barely a kilometre away, called Little Cumbrae. The Cumbraes are referred to as the Kumreyiar in the medieval Norse Saga of Haakon Haakonarson.