The drive down from Athens had been all blazing sunshine and arm-out-the-window bliss, right up until the moment I realised I'd been following the sat nav to a beach car park rather than our actual villa. Forty minutes of increasingly narrow lanes, one slightly aggressive goat, and a very patient Greek man pointing me back toward civilisation later, I finally rolled up to Agios Andreas Astros P. with dust on the bonnet and dignity in tatters.

It was late October, that funny in-between time when the summer crowds have packed up their inflatables but the sea hasn't quite got the memo about turning chilly. The villa sat there looking thoroughly pleased with itself, all whitewashed walls and terracotta roof tiles, surrounded by olive trees that had clearly seen more seasons than I have hot dinners. The garden was doing that glorious autumn thing where everything looks slightly overgrown and decadent, like nature's having one last knees-up before winter.

The key was in the lockbox, which I fumbled with for an embarrassingly long time because my hands were still vibrating from the drive. Stepping inside, the first thing that hit me was the smell of closed-up summer house, that particular blend of stone cooling down and last season's sunscreen ghosts. I threw open every shutter I could find, and suddenly the place transformed. Golden afternoon light flooded in, picking up dust motes and making the terracotta floors glow like they'd been polished specially for my arrival.

Here's the thing about coming to the Peloponnese in autumn that nobody properly warns you about: the days are still warm enough to make you feel smug about missing peak season, but the evenings sneak up on you with a chill that has you rummaging for jumpers you were convinced you wouldn't need. I found myself in this ridiculous daily rhythm of swimming in the afternoon, when the water had absorbed enough sun to feel almost bath-like, then scrambling for layers as the light started slanting that particular golden angle that means sunset's approaching faster than you'd planned.

The pool, I should mention, was having its own seasonal identity crisis. The heating had been switched off for the year, which the welcome folder informed me with cheerful bluntness. My first dip was less "refreshing Mediterranean plunge" and more "sudden full-body shock followed by triumphant swearing." But there's something about that autumn water that makes you feel properly alive, or possibly just properly foolish, depending on your perspective.

By my third evening, I'd established a routine that felt almost embarrassingly local. I'd wander down to the village as the light started fading, when the day-trippers had gone and the tavernas were lighting their outdoor heaters. The seasonal shift meant the menu had turned properly hearty, no more light salads but instead things baked slow and long, the kind of food that makes sense when there's a nip in the air. I'd eat too much, drink slightly too much of the local wine, then walk back up the hill in darkness that felt properly dark, not like the endless twilight of midsummer.

Sitting on the terrace one evening, wrapped in a blanket I'd found in a cupboard, I watched the last of the season's swallows gathering on the telephone wires and had one of those moments of slightly wine-assisted self-reflection. I'd come chasing summer, really, despite my own cleverness about off-peak travel. But what I found was something better, something transitional and honest, a place showing its other face. The villa wasn't trying to be a glossy brochure version of itself. The garden was going to seed beautifully. The pool was cold. The evenings demanded adaptation rather than effortless lounging.

It made me think about how rarely I let myself experience things in their proper season, how often I try to force the wrong weather onto a place and then feel disappointed when it doesn't comply. There's a particular kind of traveller who wants every destination to deliver eternal June, and I've definitely been her. But sitting there with my knees tucked under a blanket, watching the last light fade over the olive groves, I felt something like gratitude for the timing that had been forced upon me.

The morning I left, there was actual mist hanging over the hills, something I would have thought impossible a week earlier when I'd arrived in shorts and denial. I packed the jumpers I'd worn more than anything else, closed up the shutters against the coming winter, and drove away without needing the sat nav once. The goat, I'm fairly certain, watched me go with the same expression of mild disdain. Some things, whatever the season, never change.