I have never been so grateful for a thermos of tea in my entire life. There we were, my partner and I, crawling up the Fjordvej in our overloaded hatchback, convinced we had missed the turning for Ejsingholm Strand not once but three times. The satnav had developed what I can only describe as an existential crisis somewhere near Viborg, and I had taken over navigation duties with the confidence of a man who had briefly glanced at a map several hours earlier. We ended up down a farm track, greeted by some remarkably unimpressed Danish sheep, before finally spotting the little cluster of wooden holiday homes huddled against the Limfjorden shore. It was late October, and the light was already beginning to fade at half past three, which added a certain theatrical urgency to our arrival.

The season, I quickly realised, was doing most of the heavy lifting in terms of atmosphere. Ejsingholm Strand in autumn is not trying to impress anyone. The summer crowds have long since vanished, taking their inflatable flamingos and their cheerful disregard for windbreaks with them. What remains is something far more interesting: a landscape stripped back to its essentials. The reeds along the fjord had turned the colour of burnt sugar, and the water itself had that particular grey-green quality that makes you understand why Scandinavian painters spent so much time staring moodily at horizons.

Our little cabin, one of the traditional wooden types that cluster along this stretch of coast, was exactly what I needed after the sheep incident. The heating clicked on with a satisfying Scandinavian efficiency, and I stood for a solid five minutes with my nose practically pressed against the window, watching a heron work its way along the shoreline. My partner pointed out that I was steaming up the glass. I did not care. There is something about the liminal quality of an autumn afternoon in Jutland that makes a person want to become part of the furniture.

I had packed entirely wrong, which should surprise nobody who knows me. The weather here in late autumn does not mess about. One morning brought horizontal rain that made my supposedly waterproof jacket look like a tissue paper experiment. The next offered crisp sunshine so sharp it felt almost personal, the kind that makes every wooden plank and salt-bleached stone stand out in ridiculous detail. I learned to dress in layers with the fervour of a convert, and to never trust a clear sky farther than I could throw it.

The local rhythm in October is gloriously undemanding. The little harbour at Hvalpsund, just a short wander along the coast, had a handful of boats still in the water and a cafe that opened when it felt like it. We bought some smoked fish from a shed with a handwritten sign and ate it on a bench, wrapped in scarves, watching the ferry make its unhurried crossing. There was no pressure to achieve anything, no summer imperative to maximise daylight or tick off experiences. The season itself seemed to be saying: slow down, you absolute maniac, look at that cloud formation.

Evenings at Ejsingholm Strand in autumn become an exercise in cosy defiance. We built fires, drank more gløgg than was strictly sensible, and listened to the wind doing its considerable best to rearrange the landscape. I found myself reflecting, somewhere between my second and third mug, on how much of my holiday behaviour is usually driven by some anxious need to extract maximum value. Here, with the darkness pressing against the windows and the fjord doing whatever mysterious thing fjords do at night, that impulse simply dissolved. The season demanded nothing and offered everything in return: the particular silence of a place emptied of summer noise, the honest pleasure of being warm inside while nature has a bit of a moment outside.

We left on a morning when the first proper frost had silvered the boardwalk down to the water. My partner caught me trying to photograph the same patch of reeds I had already photographed approximately forty-seven times. I offered no defence. Some things are worth repeating, especially when the light is that particular winter-coming clarity that makes ordinary things look like they are trying to tell you something important.

I still have the thermos. It has become a sort of talisman. Every time I use it, I remember sheep, and wrong turns, and the particular gratefulness of arrival after a long journey into the shortening days.