Here are some photos of Prince Charles in Miclosoara, Romania earlier this week. I thought these photos were random as hell – Charles did a photo-op involving big, old trees! – but as it turns out, there was some method to this tree-tastic photo-op. Charles “has long been enamored of Romania’s rural traditions and now he’s set up a foundation to protect and promote them.” He was in Romania to launch the Prince Charles Romania Foundation which will focus on sustainable development and rural life. And in case you think he’s a Romania-come-lately, Charles has a “country retreat” in Romania. Yes, all of this was news to me. I had no idea he was Romania-crazy.

Meanwhile, more of Prince Charles’ letters to government officials became public yesterday. These are not the “Black Spider Memos,” although the legal wrangling involved in making those utterly mundane-if-not-blatantly-beneficial letters opened the door to this new batch of letters getting a release. And much like the release of the Black Spider Memos, it just seems like Charles is a nice guy who genuinely cares about certain issues (rural life, affordable housing, food waste, non-traditional medical treatments) a lot and will openly attempt to persuade other people to care about those issues too. You can read more about the new batch of letters here. My favorite? Charles’ letter about affordable housing.

The issue of affordable rural housing was raised by Charles when he wrote in August 2007 to Yvette Cooper, then housing and planning minister in Gordon Brown’s administration. He refers to an earlier meeting he had with Ms Cooper when they discussed affordable rural housing.

Charles then goes on to say: “I have seen from my visits around the country the real problems finding an affordable home causes for those on low incomes in the countryside – many of whom are carrying out essential jobs, such as farm workers, teachers, shopkeepers and health workers and on whom the future viability of rural life depends.”

[From Sky News]

See, that just makes me really like Charles. He travels a lot and he listens and he reads and he advocates for real, working people. Does he have a personal interest? Of course. He loves rural life, he loves country life. But he’s also spent years working towards making country life beneficial for ALL people, of all incomes.

Clarence House issued another defense of Charles’ advocacy work – which is what it is, no more, no less – but I think Charles’ press office should just let the letters speak for themselves. People will get it, and they might even like him more.

Oh, and a BBC reporter tweeted that Queen Elizabeth had died a few days ago but it was all just some sort of stupid mix-up – go here to read that story.

Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet.