Yes, we have books in English!

At the beginning of the trip we made the fatal mistake of a) not bringing enough books with us from Finland and b) not buying books in English where they were available. This has meant that we've had to resort to reading various descriptions of hotels and restaurants in places we won't be visiting in the Lonely Planet guidebook, and re-reading a Finnish book we had brought with us and finished in the first weeks of the trip.

We've visited about a dozen big bookstores where the question "Do you have books in English?" has only been met with nervous giggles and frightened stares. We were getting desperate when Christoffer spotted a school offering English courses in Goshogawara and had a stroke of genius. He ran in and asked the first person he saw if they might have some English books we could buy.

The slightly perplexed lady had to call her boss to confirm that this strange transaction was OK, but in the end a box of old books was pulled out and we were given three classic works of English literature, among them Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë.

And today our good luck continued: in a central Hakodate mall the Kumazawa bookstore had one and a half shelves of books in English! The selection included both classics and contemporary bestsellers, and this means we're fully stocked with reading material for the rest of our trip. Now the only question is how we'll manage to find any time for bike riding with so much to read...