I have never been so relieved to see a set of traffic lights in my life. There we were, three hours into what should have been a two-and-a-half-hour drive from Hamburg to Schleswig-Holstein, and I had just confidently directed my husband down a farm track that Google Maps swore was a shortcut. It was not a shortcut. It was a field. A very muddy field, currently occupied by some deeply unimpressed cows and one red-faced British woman insisting we "just needed to get past the next hedge."

By the time we actually reached Ostseeresort Olpenitz, I had promised to hand over all navigational duties for the remainder of the holiday. My husband accepted this surrender with the quiet dignity of a man who had known all along that "shortcut" was code for "imminent disaster."

The resort itself materialised suddenly after a final stretch of narrow coastal road, all timber-clad cottages huddled together like they were sharing a secret. Ours was one of the semi-detached ones, painted that particular shade of Nordic grey that looks effortlessly stylish until you realise every bit of it shows the salt spray. I loved it immediately.

The key collection was straightforward enough, though I did manage to set off some sort of alarm in the reception area by leaning on what I thought was a decorative panel. Turns out it was an emergency button. The woman behind the desk was wonderfully German about the whole thing, which is to say she fixed me with a look that made me feel both thoroughly told and somehow respected for my honesty. "It happens," she said, in perfect English, which of course made it worse.

Our cottage smelled of fresh pine and someone else's excellent coffee from the morning. The children thundered upstairs to claim beds before I could issue any instructions about shoes or luggage. I stood in the kitchen-living area with its open-plan layout and those enormous windows facing the water, and felt something in my shoulders actually drop. You know that feeling? When you have been holding tension you did not even know you possessed?

The balcony became our immediate headquarters. The Kappeln fjord stretched out all grey and glittering, and somewhere in the distance a proper sailing boat was doing proper sailing things. My daughter announced she was "definitely learning to sail this week," a declaration she has made on four consecutive holidays without once touching a tiller. My son was already investigating the communal grass area between cottages, where some other family's children were engaged in what looked like a very serious football negotiation.

I unpacked with the chaotic energy of a woman who had promised herself she would "just get organised first" before relaxing. This lasted approximately eleven minutes. The kitchen had everything we needed for self-catering, which in our family means enough tea-making equipment to survive a small siege and a fridge that would shortly contain nothing but German cheese varieties and something called "Quark" that my husband became unreasonably attached to.

By evening, the mishap of the muddy field felt like proper holiday lore already. We walked the five minutes down to the little marina area, watching the light change over the water. The resort has that particular Baltic atmosphere, all clean lines and sensible footwear and people who clearly know which knot does what on a boat.

Dinner was a simple affair back at the cottage. Pasta, local beer, children bickering affectionately about who had the better pillow upstairs. I sat on that balcony as the sky went that soft northern blue, the kind that lasts for hours, and thought about how I would probably try another shortcut before the week was out. Some things do not change. But for now, with the smell of pine and salt air and the distant sound of someone else's barbecue sizzling, being gloriously lost in Schleswig-Holstein felt exactly like being found.