I have never been so grateful for a sat nav in my entire life, and I have never wanted to throw one out of a moving car quite so badly either. The journey to Neudauberg in Lower Austria had been going swimmingly until I decided, in my infinite wisdom, that I knew a shortcut. Three wrong turns, one deeply unimpressed-looking herd of cows, and a very narrow bridge later, I arrived at the property with what I can only describe as agricultural-grade mud splattered up the side of my hire car. The owner, a wiry chap called Manfred with hands like shovels and a grin that suggested he had seen this exact scene play out a hundred times before, simply nodded at the mud and said, "Ah, you took the scenic route." I decided to take this as a compliment.

Manfred, as it turned out, was merely the opening act. He introduced me to his wife Hilda, who appeared from the kitchen wiping flour on her apron and immediately began interrogating me about whether I preferred my Schnitzel with or without lemon. Before I could fully answer, she had already decided I looked like a "without" sort of person and bustled back inside muttering about potatoes. Manfred leaned on my muddy car with the easy familiarity of a man who had leaned on many muddy cars in his time and explained that the house had been in his family since his grandfather's day, though his grandfather had apparently been considerably better at giving directions.

The next morning I ventured to the village shop for milk and bread, a transaction that took forty-five minutes. The woman behind the counter, Renate, had known Manfred since he was in short trousers and was absolutely determined that I should know every detail of his childhood misdeeds before she would accept my euros. She paused midway through a story about Manfred and a stolen apple to shout across the shop at an elderly gentleman called Otto, who was examining the tinned fish with the intensity of a man selecting a university for his child. Otto, it emerged, was the village's unofficial historian, though Renate loudly disputed several of his facts and the two of them bickered amiably for ten minutes while I stood there with my milk growing warm. Eventually Otto turned to me, as if noticing my existence for the first time, and announced that I had "honest eyes" and therefore he would tell me the true version of events. I never did get his version, because Renate shooed him out and then spent another quarter of an hour explaining why Otto was not to be trusted on anything post-1952.

That afternoon I met the final member of what I was beginning to think of as my Neudauberg ensemble cast: a teenager called Lukas who was mowing the neighbouring field on a tractor that looked older than I was. He waved me over with the enthusiasm of someone who had been waiting all day for a distraction, and within minutes was telling me about his plans to move to Vienna, become a DJ, and "make proper money, not this farming nonsense." When I asked if he told Manfred this, he looked at me with the pure horror of someone who had just realised I might be a gossip. I promised I was not, and he relaxed enough to admit that actually, he did love the farming nonsense a bit, especially the old tractor, which he had rebuilt with his father. He said this last part quietly, looking at his shoes, and I felt that peculiar holiday sensation of accidentally witnessing something genuine and unguarded.

By my third day, I had become something of a local project. Hilda was teaching me terrible Austrian phrases that she swore were polite greetings, and which Manfred would then quietly translate into what they actually meant, usually while Hilda pretended not to hear. Renate had started setting aside particular pastries for me, which I was fairly certain I had not requested but was absolutely going to eat. Even Otto had begun acknowledging me with a curt nod, which Renate assured me was the equivalent of a bear hug from anyone else.

I came to Neudauberg expecting peace and quiet, which I suppose I found in the literal sense. What I had not expected was to be folded so completely into this tiny, bickering, generous community, to become a character in their ongoing stories simply by virtue of being there and being willing to listen. On my final morning, Manfred helped me load my bags and surveyed the now-clean hire car with evident disappointment. "You will come back," he said. It was not a question. I told him I would try the main road next time. He laughed, slapped the roof of my car, and said that would be a shame, because then I would have nothing to talk about with Renate.