I have never been particularly gifted at reading ferry timetables, a fact that became painfully obvious somewhere in the middle of the Adriatic. There I was, clutching a printed booking confirmation like it was a winning lottery ticket, watching the ferry I'd actually booked sail away into the haze whilst I stood at the wrong terminal on the mainland. Turns out "Rab" and "Rijeka" start with the same letter, and my brain had apparently decided that was close enough for navigation purposes. An hour, twenty euros, and a deeply unimpressed taxi driver later, I was on the correct ferry, nursing a lukewarm coffee and what remained of my dignity.

The crossing itself was glorious, which helped. Kvarner Bay unfolded in that particular way the Adriatic does, all deep blue water and islands that look like someone dropped green velvet cushions into the sea. By the time Rab town appeared, with its medieval towers and terracotta roofs climbing up from the water, I had almost forgiven myself for the morning's performance. Almost.

Barbat sits on the southern end of Rab island, a quieter stretch where the pine forests come right down to meet shingle beaches and the occasional rocky cove. The property, when I finally found it after another minor navigational adventure involving a sat nav that insisted the sea was a road, turned out to be one of those solid stone villas with green shutters and a garden that clearly belonged to someone who actually enjoyed gardening. My kind of place, in theory. In practice, I was still slightly vibrating from caffeine and mild panic.

The key was in a lockbox, which sounds simple until you realise the code email is buried somewhere in three hundred messages about ferry updates, taxi receipts, and a promotional newsletter from a Croatian olive oil company I have no memory of subscribing to. I stood in that garden, phone held aloft like a modern-day divining rod, searching for signal and dignity in equal measure. A neighbour's cat watched the entire performance with the expression cats reserve for humans who have disappointed them.

The door finally yielded, and I stepped into cool tile and the particular silence of a house that has been waiting. First impressions: spacious, slightly old-fashioned in that comfortable way holiday properties often are, with wooden furniture that has absorbed decades of summers. The kitchen opened onto a terrace where grape vines provided actual shade, and beyond that, glimpses of water between the pines. I dropped my bag on a chair that creaked in protest and simply stood there, listening to cicadas and the distant putter of a boat engine.

It took perhaps ten minutes for the comedy to resume. Exploring the upstairs, I discovered the master bedroom had its own balcony, which I promptly stepped onto with the enthusiasm of someone who has forgotten that low stone lintels exist. The resulting collision was spectacular, audible, and entirely my own fault. I sat on the bed, hand pressed to my forehead, laughing despite myself. There is something about holiday mishaps, isn't there? At home, banging your head makes you furious. Abroad, in the heat, with the smell of pine coming through the window, it becomes somehow funny. A reminder that you are not in control, that the place is indifferent to your plans, that you are merely passing through.

I spent the evening on that terrace with a bottle of local white wine, a simple pasta I'd cobbled together from the basic supplies I'd remembered to pack, and the particular orange light that comes to Kvarner Bay as the sun drops behind the Velebit mountains on the mainland. The ferry chaos, the key hunt, the head injury, all of it receded into something almost fond. The cat had reappeared on the garden wall, still judgemental, but willing to accept a small piece of cheese in exchange for temporary truce.

That first night, I slept with the shutters open, waking once to moonlight on the water and the sound of waves on the shingle beach somewhere below. The headache had gone. The embarrassment had faded. What remained was the particular pleasure of having arrived somewhere by accident as much as design, of a place that would slowly reveal itself over the coming days, and of the quiet satisfaction that I had, despite everything, made it to Barbat.