The Dragon Tree of Parque Genoves

Cadiz used to have two famous dragon trees, then a storm took the roof off the wrong one. The Drago del Tinte, growing in a former arts and crafts school elsewhere in the city, collapsed in April 2013, leaving this specimen in Parque Genoves as the last dragon tree of any age left standing in Cadiz. Estimates for how old it actually is vary widely: the city's own parks department calls it simply centenario, over a hundred, while local guides put it as high as two hundred, and no planting record settles the question either way. What is certain is the shape, a squat grey trunk that branches only once it flowers, which for Dracaena draco can take decades, giving this specimen the umbrella silhouette that takes most dragon trees a lifetime to earn. It grows near the park's north entrance, in a garden laid out in the 19th century specifically to show off exotic imports from across the old Spanish trading network. The species itself is native to the Canary Islands and Macaronesia, not Cadiz, its sap once bottled and sold across Europe as sangre de drago, dragon's blood, a dye and a wound treatment.