Our final sightseeing on this marathon Japan blog is, naturally, the Imperial Palace. This was originally the shogun's palace, and unlike other castles, the complicated series of gates, moats and walls looked like they actually thought about defense when constructing this. It was the largest castle in the world until it was destroyed when the shogun was overthrown. The emperor inherited the site for his palace, and a series of new palaces were built and destroyed. The current palace dates from 1964, so it's bound to be ugly, but fortunately visitors can't catch a glimpse of it. The only open area is the impressive gardens surrounding the moat and walls of the imperial compound. Another trivial pursuit fact: In the 1980's the land value of the Imperial Palace was greater than the land value for the entire state of California.