Firth locally the change is held to be at the Tail of the Bank where the river crosses a sandbar off Greenock at the junction to the Gare Loch, or even further west at Gourock point. However, some firths are exceptions. The Cromarty Firth on the east coast of Scotland, for example, resembles a large loch with only a relatively small outlet to the sea and the Solway Firth and the Moray Firth are more like extremely large bays. The Pentland Firth is a strait rather than a bay or an inlet. These are connected to, or form part of, the
Firth of Lorn Mull, with widths of from to , inclusive of the islands on the east side, such as Kerrera and the Slate Islands. The west side is an ample deep-water channel leading ultimately inland to the Caledonian Canal. Although the English word firth, the Gaelic equivalent linne (as in Linne Foirthe, Firth of Forth), and all the major firth names, have been in use since proto-historic times in Scotland, the combination “Firth of Lorn” was not innovated until the late 19th century. Lorn is presumed in modern Gaelic dictionaries to be a syncope of its Gaelic form Latharna, as is the