I travel a lot in ‘olive lands’ and so I see a LOT of olive trees. I think the experts say that the oldest tree is on Crete, outside of Chania (Vouves village), but I’ve never seen any olive trees anywhere as impressive as the ones in the region just south of Monopoli in Puglia, Italy. They must be 2000 or 2500 years old. What that means is that these trees were planted by the ancient Greek colonists who first built cities along this lesser-known coast of Italy on the Adriatic in the 5th century BCE. They’re still producing olives and olive oil is still pressed from them after all these centuries. If you’ve never been to Basilicata or Puglia, or some of the other southern Italian provinces, you’re really missing out.