Eastwoodhill Arboretum

Purple Walk

The purple walk skirts along some of the higher ridges around the arboretum with good views across Douglas Park and Glen Douglas.  The trail then returns to the Visitor Centre through Cabin Park.  The extended Purple Walk turns off at Basinhead and zigzags its way up to Arateitei, the highest point in the arboretum, for some glorious views over the arboretum and surrounding countryside. 

What you'll see on the Purple Walk:

Cabin Park

Cabin Park was Douglas Cook's major extension of the Garden in the mid 1930s. He set out a series of tracks up the hill at the north western end where he in 1936 built his ‘Canadian Cabin' and planted material he thought was frost tender.

Homestead Garden

The Homestead Garden is 1.5ha and extends from the Visitor Centre to the Homestead and across to the Black Gates. Planting in the garden was piece meal at first, but in 1926, the garden expansion began with an area close to the house being reworked and "Thousands of Tulips, Hyacinths and Peonies were imported from Holland and broad herbaceous borders were made and planted, the slopes at the sides being planted in shrubs". The bulbs never survived the East Coast environment and today the garden is filled with large mass plantings of herbaceous material and annual displays.

Douglas Park

In 1945 Douglas Cook and Bill Crooks set to and plant what was to become Douglas Park (10 ha). However a lengthy drought followed and the whole planting failed. Douglas took it as a judgement and did not go back to replant until 1949. At this point the material from England had begun to arrive in quantity. So today we have as a focal point of this valley a marvellous collection of oak species about the main tracks that make up Douglas Park.

Glen Douglas

Douglas Cook originally put aside land in what is now called Glen Douglas to give to Rob Bayly then curator of Pukeiti to start a nursery venture which due to lack of money, never eventuated. Most of Glen Douglas was planted in 1960-1961 and as with Douglas Park it has a strong theme of oaks alders and a Sorbus collection set amongst a series of ponds running down the valley.

Canaan

In August 1985, a severe overnight rainstorm hit the Ngatapa area. Over 10 inches of rain fell. A major slip from the skyline ridge in Canaan descended and flowed right into Basinhead. Much plant material was lost in this area including a large lilac collection. At the top of Canaan is a poplar planting as a trial of a Populus.deltoides x P. nigra 'Italica' [Lombardy poplar] hybrid. To the left is of a planting of Cupressus lusitanica, both these have been planted to secure the soil on this hill and more specimen trees planted on the lower slopes. The view from the top of Canaan, the highest point in the arboretum, extends up the East Coast to Mt Hikarangi and across to Te Urawera National Park to the west.

Mexico Way

Mexico Way was planted in the late 1980s and 1990s and along with China Corner, is one of our few geographical collections with trees from Central and Southern America. Many of these trees have been introduced by Bob Berry of Hackfalls Arboretum.