After breakfast, we headed via Subway to the Imperial Palace Grounds...located in downtown Tokyo! Here I am in front of one of the main gates...just a few feet from a subway entrance!
The castle grounds and most of the stonework is hundreds of years old. Alot was damaged over the centuries by fire, and World War II.
Most of the castle grounds are surrounded by moats...such as this shot looking to the left as you head for one of the entrance gates.
Looking backwards from the bridge over the moat area...you see alot of government buildings. Just behind those trees in the middle is the subway entrance, and the first shot above had me standing where the yellow Taxi is....
We all stopped to take some photos, and look at the large number of Coi fish swimming in the moat..
Here is a shot of Teresa and me standing by one of the outer gates. To get into the main residence, it is necessary to go thru a dozen gates...each one with guards. Or at least they had squads of guards in the olden days.
Another shot looking back at the skyscrappers...it is a very big difference in form and thought...and time! A very zen kind of thing I guess....
Teresa and Ali have fun being Rob and my models with all our camera taking time.....
Here is one of the ancient guard houses. All the nobel families were required to furnish low level and high level Samurai warriors to volunteer to protect the Imperial Palace and it's grounds. A nice Japanese man pointed out the many kinds of symbols on the buildings....such as
This symbol, which is the symbol for water or rain. This symbol on the building is susposed to help keep the building from catching fire and burning down. There are also Imperial crests, and family crests on the buildings.
Here is one of the larger, more senior Samurai barracks. Suspossedly 80 Samurai lived in this building.
Teresa poses for a shot, showing the scale and size of the stonework all over. The masonry skills were pretty good, and the sheer number of stone walls, ramps and battlements was impressive.
Here is a shot of one of the few remaining guard towers that overlooked sections of the moat. Most had burned down thru the years, and have not been replaced.
The ladies and Rob check out a really big spider and it's really big web overhead. Me and Rob were not too concerned about it, but for some reason the ladies were a bit concerned that the spider was a "man killer"...heh...
Here is some of the inner grounds. There are several large open fields where the Japanese go to relax and have social functions.
There are many paths leading thru hundreds of acres. All the areas have different looks, forms and trees.