4.11-21. Japan by rail. Summary.

Armed with JR pass (¥28300 for a week or ¥45100 for 2 weeks, can only be bought abroad), I managed to zoom over many towns along Shikansen line. Should have allocated more time in Kyoto and Nara. My favorites sites:

• Meiji-jingu 明治神宮 in Tokyo
• Koraku-en 後楽園 in Okayama for its exquisite garden
• Ryoan-ji 竜安寺 in Kyoto for its rock garden
• Ninan zaka 二年板 and Sannen aka 三年板 in Kyoto for traditional streets
• The floating torii at Miyajima 宮島
• Himeji-jo 姫路城
• Tsuikiji market 築地市場 in Tokyo for fish and produce, Nishiki-dori market 錦小路 in kyoto for prepared goods, especially pickles

Click the following links for where I visited (albeit briefly), or just read the previous post (very long) :
4.11: Nikko 日光,
4.12-14: Tokyo 東京,
4.15: Nagano 長野 to Okayama, via Matsumoto 松本,
4.16: around Okayama 岡山: Himeji 姫路, Takamatsu 高松, Kurashiki 倉敷,
4.17: around Hiroshima 広島: Iwakuni 岩国, Miyajima 宮島,
4.18: on the way to Kyoto, stop by Onimichi 尾道,
4.18-20: Kyoto 京都, Nara 奈良,
4.21: Ito 伊東, Yokohama 横浜.

Overall positive impression:

• clean (even though garbage cans are hard to find, there's almost no litter on street).
• orderly (all trains are on time, and stop at the very same spot. People form 2 queues where a door is supposed to be, so the disembarking passengers can exit between the two. Everyone follows signs, which are many: which side of stairs to walk up or down, garden visit routes, ..., and you will be corrected if you try otherwise.)
• impeccable service (I was 10 minutes late for Mazda's factory tour. The receptionist apologized for making me wait 5-10 minutes for the bus to come and pick me up!)
• job well done down to the last detail (I saw a woman cleaning the inside of a garbage can.). This renewed my appreciation of Japanese products.
• simple forms of traditional architecture.
  
• smart school uniforms.
• tasty strawberries.

Negative impression:

• overcrowded (subway trains can be packed to burst the doors), especially Tokyo.
  
• expensive ($1 to dial a domestic phone#. Tokyo to Kyoto is $100-150 one way for 320 miles. A 0.5l bottle/can from a vending machine is $1.5).
  
• wasteful over-packaging.
• people smoke (non-smoking venues are available).
• natural scenery is often spoiled by concrete and steel.
  
• public transportation stops well before midnight.
• cheap modern construction: thin walls, single pane glasses, incoherent with surroundings.
• mistakes in English in official pamphlet (for example, the map of the imperial garden).
  

Odd observation:

• most streets have no names!
• strange fashion: every woman wears fish net stockings and/or skirt over pants, paints her face (at least her eyes) and dyes her hair. Young and not so young men dye their hair bright yellow.
  
• affinity to cute things, regardless of age and gender. Everyone attaches trinket to their cellphones. I saw one woman who had to bend over when she answered her phone, because one of her 5 or 6 dangling cuties got entangled to her purse.

Ornamental cherry is unquestionably the national tree. It's everywhere, often by the hundreds at one spot. Too bad, I missed the peak by a week. The Japanese are so diligent in cleaning, I didn't even get to see many pedals on the ground. For up to date bloom condition and photos, check this sakura report. Japan Meteorology Agency also publishes a bloom forecast every year.

Another good time to visit Japan is November, when Japanese Maples paint the sky red. Timing is not as critical as the 3 days of mankai. (None of these 3 photos are mine.)

By being frugal, and staying mostly with friends, my 11 days in Japan costed about $1900 (only about $480 is the plane ticket!) .