Oakabella Camp 3 November 2006

In the morning we headed inland to visit an old farm, now proclaimed as the Hutt River Principality. We were surprised to be personally greeted by His Excellency, Prince Leonard, who gave us a personal tour of his province. He is a very intelligent man, who understands the constitutional and legal aspects of his succession and has held the government at bay for 40 years. The whole province is rather run down now and looking rather sad. It is obviously not a threat to government but a clever challenge to the laws what we all think are so solid. It demonstrates that they are illusionary and we need to be careful about what the government proclaims as law.
We then headed down to Port Gregory and its Pink Lake that is coloured a pinky-purple - amazing stuff, with the colour much brighter than we expected. Port Gregory is a very small seaside village waiting for the summer rush. It has a large reef wall protecting it from the sea. In the afternoon, we travelled down to Northampton, which was a delightful town with historical buildings making up the living streetscape. It had the feel of Berry and Gulgong. There was a fantastic sunken garden in the fashion of an English garden. What a sight for a garden lover! It was getting too hot but then the sky blackened and an electrical storm set in, with monster rain drops on the edge.
Turned off down a very rough road for 3km to buy cheap fruit from an orchard. We glutted ourselves on nectarines and peaches. The box was $10 for about 5kg. Saw a few small fires in the wheat paddocks that had just started after the passing of the thunder storm. Camped in a roadside bush camp that looked out to the wheat fields.