The thing about driving on the right, I've decided, is that you should probably remember to do it before you've already frightened a Croatian grandmother outside Pula airport. I'd only been in Istria ten minutes and there I was, apologising profusely through a closed window to a woman who looked remarkably unshocked, as if British tourists routinely tried to kill her on zebra crossings.

My hire car and I eventually limped into Banjole in one piece, though my dignity remained somewhere on the roundabout near Medulin. The property sat up a quiet lane, all terracotta roof and cream walls, with a terrace that seemed to wink at me in the afternoon sun. I dumped my case, found a cold beer in the fridge, and immediately felt the sort of smug satisfaction that only comes from booking somewhere with an actual outdoor grill and a view of pine trees.

That first evening I ventured to the little harbour at Volme, which is essentially Banjole's more photogenic cousin. The water was that particular Adriatic blue that makes you suspicious of filters. I sat at a konoba with a plate of sardines and watched an old man in a faded cap untangle fishing line with the patience of someone who had absolutely nowhere else to be for the next several years. He caught me staring and shrugged, as if to say, "What else would I do?"

The waiter, a wiry chap called Goran with spectacular eyebrows, took my mangled attempt at ordering wine as a personal challenge. "You want the red? No, you don't want the red, it's Tuesday," he announced, despite it being Thursday. He brought white anyway, and refused my menu, simply saying, "You eat fish, I bring fish." The fish arrived, and I understood that Goran ran this terrace like a benevolent dictator. When I tried to pay, he waved me off to speak to his brother at the bar, who spoke no English whatsoever but communicated through elaborate hand gestures that I believe meant I was now part of their family.

Walking back in the dark, slightly wine-happy, I got lost among identical-looking lanes of holiday homes. A woman hanging laundry under a porch light directed me with what I initially thought were insults but turned out to be perfectly helpful directions. "Straight, stupid, then left at the cat," she said, pointing at an orange tomcat who did indeed seem to be waiting at a junction. I followed him. He led me home, or near enough, then sat washing himself with the air of someone who'd done his good deed for the evening.

The next morning I met the neighbour, a German retiree called Dieter who'd been coming to this exact spot for twenty-three years and had opinions about everything, particularly my parking. "You park like my wife," he observed, unprompted, from his terrace. "She is dead now, so maybe you improve." He told me he'd buried three cars in this country and intended to bury none more, then offered me figs from his tree, which were genuinely the best I'd ever tasted.

By day three I'd established a routine of morning coffee on my terrace, watching a local man walk his ancient dog past the property at precisely eight-fifteen. The dog moved with geological slowness; the man moved slower, out of solidarity I assumed. We nodded each morning, never speaking, bound by this silent contract of holiday normalcy.

Istria had got me already, not through its obvious charms but through these small, stubborn human moments. The place felt less like a destination and more like somewhere that had simply continued being itself until I happened to wander through. I was already dreading the drive back to the airport, though I promised myself I'd remember which side of the road to use this time. Probably.