I have never been so grateful for a thermos of tea in my entire life, and that includes the time I attempted to climb Scafell Pike in flip-flops. The journey to Kollerup Klit in North Jutland had already delivered its own small comedy before I even set foot on a proper walking path.

It began with the Sat Nav. I had punched in the postcode with the confidence of someone who once navigated the Lake District without incident, which in hindsight should have been my first warning. The device led me down a farm track so narrow that I found myself nose-to-nose with a tractor, its driver wearing the kind of expression that suggested this happened weekly and he had mentally prepared a list of choice Danish phrases for the occasion. I reversed for nearly half a mile, my neck twisted like an owl spotting prey, until I found a gap barely wider than the car itself. The farmer waved me past with what I can only describe as theatrical pity. I arrived at the cottage with my hands still vibrating from the steering wheel and my dignity somewhere back near that tractor.

The cottage itself, when I finally found it sitting sensibly among the dunes, felt like a reward. Low timber cladding, that particular Scandinavian smell of wood and sea air, and windows that framed the North Sea like a painting someone had thoughtfully hung just for me. I dumped my bags with the enthusiasm of a Labrador and immediately decided a walk was in order. The weather was doing that thing British weather does when it wants to lull you into false security - pale sunshine, a breeze that felt almost friendly, clouds arranged artfully rather than threateningly.

I set off toward the beach with a rucksack containing one apple, a map I had not yet unfolded, and the unshakeable confidence of the poorly prepared.

The first hour was magnificent. The sand stretched in that pale Nordic way, almost white in places, and the sea moved with a rhythm that made my shoulders drop two inches. I walked north along the shoreline, passing the occasional beach hut in faded colours, watching gulls argue over territory. The dunes rose to my left, covered in marram grass that bent and whispered in the wind. I felt terribly pleased with myself, the kind of smug that only comes from believing you have outsmarted the elements.

Then the sky changed.

It did not gradually darken or offer polite warnings. One moment I was photographing a particularly handsome piece of driftwood, the next I was standing in what I can only describe as a vertical sea. The rain arrived with such commitment that I actually laughed out loud, a single bark of disbelief before I started running for the dunes in the vain hope of shelter. My waterproof jacket, purchased in a British sale and never properly tested, proved itself to be water-resistant in the same way a sieve is resistant to water. Within minutes I could feel it pooling in my sleeves, running down my spine, gathering in my boots with the enthusiasm of a mountain stream.

I found a hollow in the dunes and crouched there like a soggy hobbit, watching my carefully planned coastal hike dissolve into weather. The apple had gone mushy. My map was becoming papier-mache. I sat with my back against the sand and drank my tea, which was still miraculously warm, and laughed at the absurdity of it all. Here I was, a grown adult with access to weather forecasts, defeated by Danish drizzle in a way that felt almost traditional.

The storm passed as quickly as it had arrived, because of course it did. The North Jutland coast does not do prolonged misery; it prefers the dramatic gesture, the sudden flourish, then back to business. I squelched back to the cottage with my boots making that particular wet squeak that announces failure to anyone within earshot. The heating went on, the kettle went on, and I stood at those same windows watching the light change over the sea while my socks dried on the radiator.

The next morning I tried again, because what else do you do? This time with proper boots, actual waterproofs borrowed from the cottage's sensible storage cupboard, and a thermos twice the size. The same beach looked different - the same dunes, the same sea, but I noticed more. The way the light caught wet sand, the patterns left by retreating water, the particular silence of a place after rain. I walked further than planned, all the way to the point where the beach curves and the fishing boats sit pulled up on the shore, their paint peeling in that handsome Scandinavian way.

That evening, back at Kollerup Klit with my feet up and the wood burner doing its work, I thought about the tractor and the rain and the apple. There is something about walking in weather that does not cooperate that strips away the performance of it all. You are simply there, getting on with it, finding what warmth and beauty you can. The British in me recognised this immediately, of course. We are raised on the idea that proper enjoyment requires mild suffering, that the best stories come from things going slightly wrong.

I would not trade that soggy hour in the dunes for a perfectly sunny stroll. The tea tasted better for it, the fire felt warmer, and the second day's walking had a quality of earned pleasure that fair weather simply cannot manufacture. North Jutland had given me exactly what I needed without my asking, which is perhaps the best thing any holiday can do.

My boots are still not completely dry, by the way. I keep them in the porch as a reminder that the best plans are the ones flexible enough to survive a good soaking.