The stranger was astonished when I guessed that he was a city worker who had retired early from a career in finance. I was almost right: he’d spent his entire working life at the Treasury.

After queuing for my food at the buffet table (and waiting for a fresh supply of skewered prawns) I looked around for my new friend. I thought that he would make a good dining companion so hoped to sit with him.

Unfortunately all the places at his table were taken so I took my plate of food to the shoreline. There I could watch the seals in the sunshine as I ate. The hotel proprietor called me straight back from the water’s edge. If I sat there, I’d be swept into the sea as soon as the tide came in.

I now needed to find somewhere else to sit so I wandered over to the tennis umpire’s chair. If I were able to climb up here, this would make a good vantage point.

As I put my foot on the bottom step of the ladder to climb up to the chair I heard some guards make rude remarks about Dame Kelly Holmes.