The Weeping Willow Tree

This Weeping Willo Tree does not exist anymore, but imagine it halfway out into Ardmore Street. In this photo you will note the three petrol bowsers which extend into what we now know as the street. Back in the late 1920s when this photo was taken, the street was not much more than a single-lane gravel track. When the tree first showed a glimmer of life, it was but a dirt-track.

There is more than one story about the tree’s origin but the descendants of John Barclay Ewing claim that it was John who planted a stake opposite the Wānaka Hotel. Richard Norman in writing about another newspaper report on the tree’s origins involving buried beer bottles, would only go so far to state that an 8-foot willow stick was planted in 1868 and it rooted and grew.

It grew very well, and it is reported that it became the focus of casual street meetings and where locals posted notices on its trunk. No doubt it was also handy to tie up the horse whilst the rider visited the hotel across the road!