Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Let's go for a walk... Part 8: The Ruins

It's been a while since we've been on a walk with my dog, so I figure it's about time to do that again, especially since I got sidetracked, last year, by A to Z and never told y'all about the ruins. Actually, I did mention them back in the post about Goblin Town, but I didn't go into too much detail.
This area was first settled by the Russians. They set up here in the early 1800's in order to hunt these guys:
The sea otter. The sea otter has the thickest fur of all other animals, so their pelts are very valuable. You know, more valuable than gold and all of that. [As a total aside, they were hunted to near extinction by 1900, at which point less than 1% of their estimated original population was left, as few as 1000 of them still in the wild (from a population that may have exceeded 300,000 in 1800). No, it wasn't just the Russians that did this, but they were (mostly) responsible for it in this area.]

What the Russians found here, though, was more than just sea otters. They found an area infested with goblins, goblins that also hunted otters but not to the extreme that humans did.

Initially, the Russians set up Fort Ross.
The fort was to defend against goblin attacks. They even joined forces with various Native American tribes to fight against the goblins that were being agitated by the swelling numbers of settlers.

Eventually, the Russian-American Company collaborated to build a stone fortress just down the creek from where I live. It must have been an impressive structure based upon the ruins that are still there. You can see the outline of how big the structure was in the remains of the foundation.
The goblins didn't take kindly to the building of a castle in the midst of their lands, so they mustered their various tribes for a large assault against the humans with the intention of driving them out of their lands. It was a terrible battle. Vicious. Bloody. The creek ran red with the blood of the fallen for weeks.

The humans lost. And the goblins tore down the castle, leaving no stone upon another.

But it came at a tremendous cost to the goblins. The survivors were forced to join together into one tribe just to survive. Retreating to their tunnels,

they have remained hidden through the years as the humans came back and completely overran lands that were once theirs.

However, of late, they have once again been growing bold and can often be seen crawling out of their tunnels at dusk to scavenge for food and other bits and pieces of things they find useful.

17 comments:

  1. I don't remember - was this all from the imagination of your kids or did you help?

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  2. Walks with my dogs are never this interesting. =)

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  3. You enjoy freaking your kids out, don't you?

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  4. Alex: These are the stories I tell my kids (and their friends) about where we live.

    M.J.: Maybe it's the environment? And, hey, at least you don't get chased by trolls and goblins, right?

    L.G.: Oh, they like it! My daughter, especially, likes to tell her friends all about this stuff.

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  5. Didn't the goblins move away?

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  6. I'd love to have had cool stories like that told to me as a child.

    All my dad ever said was, "Time to get up and go move the pipe at the farm!"

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  7. Love it! Thank goodness the goblins lost that battle. Imagine life today if they hadn't.

    Shannon at The Warrior Muse

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  8. All I can say is there otter be a law. I guess people are just goblin up these stories you tell.

    Lee
    Wrote By Rote

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  9. What a history there. Russians and Goblins.

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  10. Jo: No, just underground.

    Michael: Move the pipe at the farm? I don't remember any pipes at my grandparents' farm.

    Shannon: Well, actually, they won. It was just a Pyrrhic victory.

    Lee: Pretty punny, Lee. Pretty punny!

    Rusty: Yeah, you can't lose with Russians and goblins!

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  11. I wonder how a pack of sea otters fares against an army of goblins?

    Also, not sure if you saw, but I put up a review for House on the Corner and it... wasn't deleted! Hurray!

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  12. ABftS: Speaking of otters, I saw two this morning. Not sea otters but still otters.

    I did see it! Thanks!

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  13. I love this, Andrew! I love how you create a story for your kids and keep it going for them. What fun. I do the same but for us it's witches and it "supposed" to be "true around these here parts" ha ha ha

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  14. Walks with you sound fun and creative... :)

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  15. Elsie: Oh, mine are true. Completely. 100% It's not my fault other people don't know about all of this stuff!

    Rebecca: It makes you wonder why it's so difficult to get my kids to go on them. Or maybe it just makes me wonder.

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  16. I wonder what the goblins think of all the people that are moving up from marin county and settling their lands? Or wait- maybe the Marinites are actually the descendants of goblins??

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  17. Winopants: Well, you know what they say about Marin. Actually, I only know what my wife says about Marin, but...

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