The Kloosterpark Oak

The name gives away a building that is no longer there. This oak's register entry calls it the kloosterparkeik, the cloister-park oak, for a convent that stood on this ground until its garden was redeveloped and folded into the wider Leijpark. The convent, home to the Congregatie van Onze Lieve Vrouw der Afzondering in het Cenakel, was founded here in 1908, close to when this tree is thought to have gone in. Two tall black residential towers now stand where the convent's own garden once did, built after the land was sold on. The oak survived that whole transition, tucked into the far northeast corner of the Leijpark in what is still locally called the Kloosterparkbos, a patch of wood the wider park's paths were simply extended to include rather than replace. The Leijpark itself, 30 hectares designed by Leonard Springer in 1919 and built between 1934 and 1939 as unemployment relief work once land negotiations finally cleared, is well documented; this corner and its convent past rest on the tree register alone, so treat that part as a good story rather than a settled fact. The register cannot say which oak it is, so that stays an open question for whoever visits next. Free, open daily, an easy add to the existing Leijpark walk.