The pair, understood to be from the Dunoon area, raised the alarm via a mobile phone at 10.23pm after their five-metre long rigid inflatable boat got into difficulties in heavy seas and force six winds.

More than five hours later, after a major search involving the Rothesay and Dunoon coastguard rescue teams, the RNLI's Largs and Tighnabruaich lifeboats, the Strathclyde Police patrol vessel, a Royal Navy search and rescue helicopter and a nearby yacht, the men were found on shore after the coastguard teams saw a fire alight near Ardmaleish Point.

The men ran into difficulties after the weather worsened as they tried to return to Cowal following a day out at the Bute Highland Games.

Rothesay coastguard team leader Malcolm Johnston told us: "We were called out in response to a report from someone who had seen a black rubber dinghy drifting in Rothesay Bay.

"The weather was absolutely horrendous - the wind had got up, there was very heavy rain and visibility was extremely poor, and we couldn't see anything.

"We called the Largs and Tighnabruaich lifeboats, and the police launch was in the harbour so we asked them to assist, along with another yacht that was in the vicinity - and after a short while we asked for help from the helicopter too because of the dreadful weather."

The men, who had no radio, no flares and only one lifejacket, made a 999 call from a mobile phone, but the battery ran out before the searchers could pinpoint their location.

"Their signal was picked up by the Toward aerial so we knew they were in that vicinity," Malcolm continued.

"Luckily, soon after that the weather abated - the wind dropped and the rain stopped, and just before three o'clock we spotted a fire on the shore at Ardmaleish; we drove round there and the lifeboats went to the scene, and the casualties were found ashore."

On arriving at Ardmaleish shortly before 3am, the Bute coastguards discovered that neither of the boat's occupants was wearing appropriate clothing, and suspected that both may have been drinking before setting out on their voyage.

"They had sobered up somewhat by the time we got there," Malcolm continued, "but it was obvious that some alcohol had been taken.

"They were both very chastened when we got to them. They realised what they had done and how stupid they had been, and were very subdued and apologetic.

"It's really important that people who go to sea are properly equipped with flares, a radio and lifejackets, and that they bear in mind the effect that alcohol can have on them.

"If the weather hadn't abated there would almost certainly have been a very different outcome. They were very, very fortunate that the wind and the tide pushed them on to the shore - if the wind had been coming from a different direction they could easily have gone drifting up Loch Striven and anything could have happened to them.

"They're both very, very lucky to be alive."

The search operation took place during the latest in a series of 48-hour strikes by coastguard control room workers in a long-running dispute over pay, but the Maritime and Coastguard Agency said the strike would not have any effect on normal coastguard services, and that rescue helicopters and RNLI boats would continue to operate.