The Lebanon Cedars of Schoonoord

Rotterdam's own garden site and Wikipedia both single out this pair as the best-known trees in the whole of Schoonoord, and neither source agrees on how old they are. Standing together at one point in the garden, they read as one feature rather than two. The estate's own history puts their planting at the garden's original 1860s layout, which would make them roughly 155 to 165 years old today. Wikipedia and several tourism write-ups instead call them 'ruim 250 jaar oud', over 250 years, which would put their planting before the garden existed at all: either they arrived here as already-mature transplants, or the figure is a repeated claim nobody has checked. Neither can be preferred with confidence, so both are recorded rather than one picked over the other. What is not in dispute is the setting. Schoonoord is a 1.2-hectare former country estate on the Kievitslaan, a protected Rijksmonument since 2000, owned by the Stichting Schoonoord and open to the public since 1973. A copper beech from the same original planting stands nearby. Entry is free, daily from 8:30 to 16:30, though the garden closes during the large festivals held next door in Het Park.