West-shores

From the beginning of the Second Age, High King Gil-galad ruled the shoreland realm of Lindon as a realm of the Elves in the far northwest of Middle-earth. There the Elves dwelt in a peaceful land that lay between the Blue Mountains and the West-shores of the Great Sea.

After the making of the Three Rings in faraway Eregion, the Jewel-smith Celebrimbor discovered Sauron's evil intentions for his people, and so he sent two of the Three northward to Gil-galad for safekeeping, far from the dangers of the Dark Lord. The Rings were kept safe in Lindon through the remaining years of the Second Age and far into the Third, until the Wizards came out of the West to land at Mithlond, Lindon's Grey Havens.

At that time Gil-galad had long been lost, but Círdan still held the Red Ring Narya at the Grey Havens. Among the new arrivals was the being who would become known as Gandalf, and Círdan immediately saw the Wizard's inner wisdom. Rather than keep the Red Ring unused, far from danger on the West-shores, he passed it to the Grey Messenger, who bore it on his travels across Middle-earth through the rest of the Third Age. At the end of the Age, Gandalf returned to the West-shores, alongside the Keepers of the other two Rings of the Elves, and together they sailed away from the shores of Middle-earth aboard the White Ship.