I should have known the holiday was going to be interesting when I put the wrong postcode into the sat nav and ended up in what I can only describe as a very enthusiastic farmer's front garden. There I was, bumper practically touching his woodpile, both of us waving apologetically through windscreens like two British people who'd just accidentally taken the last biscuit. Turns out "Bad" in Bad Kleinkirchheim doesn't mean what you think it means, and neither does my sense of direction.

The actual journey from Klagenfurt Airport had been dreamy enough - all rolling meadows and those ridiculous Austrian villages that look like they've been plucked from a chocolate box. But my detour meant I arrived at the property in the late afternoon glow rather than midday, which as it happened was rather magical. The place sits tucked into the hillside with views that make you forget you nearly caused an international farming incident.

I dumped my bags with the relief of someone who'd been driving on the wrong side of the road for three hours and decided to explore on foot before dinner. This was where the proper adventure began. I had a rough map from the welcome pack, but I've always been one of those people who thinks "I'll just nip down this path and see where it goes" is a legitimate navigation strategy.

The woodland trail behind the property started innocently enough. Well-maintained, signposted, the sort of thing sensible people walk. But I spotted a smaller track branching off, barely more than a deer path, and something about the light filtering through the pines made me follow it. Within ten minutes I had no idea where I was. Properly, completely lost. My phone had signal but I refused to check it on principle - this was meant to be an escape, wasn't it?

The path opened suddenly into a clearing I'd never have found otherwise. A tiny chapel, barely bigger than a garden shed, sat there with weathered wooden walls and a bell that looked older than my grandmother. No sign, no tourist information, just some faded flowers in a jar by the door and the overwhelming sense that I'd stumbled into somewhere private and precious. I sat on the step for a good while, listening to nothing but wind and distant cowbells, feeling that particular loneliness that isn't lonely at all.

I wandered further, if wander is the right word for purposeful meandering while pretending you know exactly where you're going. Found a stream where the water ran so clear you could count the stones, and followed it downstream like some hopeless explorer. This led me to a meadow where an elderly woman was collecting wild herbs in a basket, and despite my terrible German and her patient smiles, she communicated through gestures that I should try the leaves she was picking. Some kind of wild sorrel, sharp and lemony. She pointed me toward a track that she indicated would take me back toward the village, though her expression suggested she found my general disarray rather amusing.

That track delivered me to a viewpoint I'd never have reached by design, overlooking the whole valley with the evening mist starting to rise. The thermal spa complex glinted in the distance, modern and strange against the ancient landscape. I made a mental note to visit properly, but somehow this accidental discovery felt more valuable than any planned excursion.

Dinner that night was at a gasthof I'd never have found without my earlier wandering, a place with four tables and a landlord who recommended the Kasnudeln with the confidence of someone who'd made them himself. He wasn't wrong. The Carinthian cheese pasta, heavy with mint and served with a salad of whatever was growing nearby, tasted of the afternoon somehow - of getting lost and finding things.

I walked back to the property in proper darkness, torch app blazing, still refusing to use maps. Took a different wrong turn and found myself at a small lake, moonlight catching the ripples. Stood there like an idiot, grinning at nothing, thinking about how my spectacular navigational failure had become the whole point.

That's the thing about places like this, I suppose. You come for the skiing or the spas or the hiking, all perfectly excellent reasons. But what stays with you are the moments when your own incompetence becomes a kind of gift. The chapel, the herb woman, the moonlit water - none of it was in any brochure I saw. I had to earn my disorientation, had to trust that getting lost in Carinthia was somehow safer than getting lost in my own routine back home.

The next morning I did try the thermal baths, properly organised and sensible. Lovely, of course. But I kept thinking about that clearing, that little chapel, wondering if I could find it again. I set out after lunch with deliberate intention to get lost, which I realise defeats the purpose somewhat. Never did find the exact spot. Found others instead, equally accidental, equally mine for a moment.

I left with a collection of these unplanned discoveries, no photographs worth sharing, just the persistent memory of being somewhere without knowing precisely where. My sat nav remains untrustworthy, my sense of direction unreformed. But Bad Kleinkirchheim gave me permission to be gloriously, productively lost, and I've been trying to carry that particular skill home with me ever since.