Girnigoe Castle and the newer Castle Sinclair are situated three miles north of the Caithness town of Wick, at the point where the Pentland Firth meets the North Sea.  The castles dominate the Noss Head peninsula, and must have seemed impregnable from the sea.  The Sinclair name was feared and respected in the north, and little now remains of these two castles.  Girnigoe dates from the end of the 15th century, and Castle Sinclair from 1606.  Both castles were ruined as the result of clan battles in the 17th century.