Imperial Palace is currently located at the former site of Edo Castle, a large park area surrounded by moats and massive stone walls in the center of Tokyo. If you are not sure on which direction, just follow the moat. 

The thing is, we underestimated the distance that we need to go through in order to reach Imperial Palace. We were pretty much feeling soreness in both legs as we tried to locate the entrance to Imperial Palace. 

Once we have found a map of the Imperial Palace grounds, we saw that it is actually very big and since it functions as the residency of Japan's imperial family, the inner grounds of the palace are generally not open to the public. Visitors are able to enter the inner palace grounds only on January 2 (New Year's Greeting) and December 23 (Emperor's Birthday) to see the members of the Imperial Family, who make several public appearances on a balcony.

The high buildings in Marunouchi all turns to yellow and orange hue as the sun was ready to set in a bit. And yes, at this point of time, we only figured out that the only open section of Imperial Palace to the public is the Imperial Palace East Gardens. 

And guess what, the entrance to the Imperial Palace East Gardens is so far away because we went to the wrong direction the first time. As you could see from the building's window, the sun was barely visible now. 

When we saw visitors coming out from the entrance direction, we realised that the Imperial Palace East Gardens is closed for admission after 16.30. Bummer, I suppose we could only try to go again the next time, without getting lost. 

Oh well, on a brighter note, we had completely digested our lunch and we were ready to eat dinner now. LOL. #foodcomesfirst