After a short night, we set out relatively early. We meet our friend Clare at Gunwharf Quays. After a croissant and hot chocolate at a café, we stroll through the harbor area, passing many colorful townhouses. We watch the ferry as it sets sail for the Isle of Wight – that’s where Clare and her husband Dan are originally from.

On our walk, we take a peek inside Portsmouth Cathedral, which has a large golden ship on its roof serving as a weather vane. It seems a rehearsal for tonight’s performance is taking place here right now: Someone is telling the story of Peter and the Wolf while drawing a picture, accompanied by an orchestra. That’s so quintessentially British.

Then we’re back at Gunwharf Quays, a large open-air outlet shopping promenade. We buy candy for the Halloween party I’m organizing at work, cookies, and those delicious chocolate bars that are just the right size (18 grams) for me. I also want to stop by Moss, where I found such a nice suit last time. And right in the back corner, we spot something great again: I try on the suit and love it so much that I buy it right away – including the vest and tie.

All that shopping really worked up an appetite. So we stop for a bite at Slim Chickens and are soon ready to do some more shopping. Even though we don’t buy anything else. In the middle of the afternoon, we head back to the hotel.

We’ll meet up again in the evening. We’ll have dinner with Clare and Dan at the Pan Asian Plaza. And we’re truly blown away by the selection: We’re sitting at the Korean hot pot and table grill and can choose from about 100 different items at the buffet – from beef, chicken, fish, and seafood to noodles, mushrooms, vegetables, and sauces. We then dip them into the broth, just like with meat fondue, or cook them on the hot plate.

But there’s so much more! The pan-Asian restaurant truly lives up to its name: there’s Japanese sushi, Indian and Vietnamese dishes served in large pots for you to help yourself to, Chinese sweet-and-sour platters with chicken and beef and steamed buns, Thai curries, and much more. Everything is included in the price, which works out to about 50 francs per person. And of course, that includes the huge dessert buffet—for which we had almost no room left after all that food: ice cream, various mousses, crêpes, cotton candy, popcorn, Jell-O, and so much more.