With the gardens having been closed as part of the Covid restrictions, we managed a visit here at the weekend … just before our most recent State of Emergency.

We walked around the area in dark green on the map, the East Gardens. Covering 210,000 square metres, these gardens were renovated in the 1960’s. Our timing wasn’t great as we have missed the cherry blossom, the roses and the irises! But given that the Imperial Palace is at the centre of what is considered the world’s largest city, we couldn’t believe how much the trees and landscaping successfully blocked out noise. The cicadas were on full volume though!

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There is an woodland grove that contains 47 trees, each tree representing a prefecture in Japan. The photograph below shows a part of this area

And finally, I was pleased to see that security had checked out all the drains so we had no-one jumping out & holding us hostage! Or do you think this is done before the Emperor takes a stroll?

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