Overview of Gigha

A small island of the Inner Hebrides, Gigha lies to the west of the Kintyre peninsula from which it is separated by the Sound of Gigha. Ardminish on the east coast is linked by ferry to Tayinloan in Kintyre. Stretching 6 miles (10 km) from north to south and with an area of 1395 ha (3447 acres), Gigha largely comprises a ridge of volcanic and metamorphic rocks. The island was granted to the Lords of the Isles in the 14th century and passed to the MacNeills in the 1490s. In 1944 it was purchased by Sir James Horlick who established a garden in the woodlands surrounding Achamore House with plants supplied by the National Trust for Scotland. The island was eventually the subject of a community buy-out in 2002. To the south of the main settlement at Ardminish stand the ruins of the 13th-century chapel of Kilchattan.