I have never been a natural navigator, which is why I found myself standing in a Grottaferrata car park at midday, arguing with a sat nav that had decided "Via Anagnina" was more of a concept than an actual road. Three hours earlier I had breezed out of Fiumicino airport full of confidence, windows down, singing along to Radio 2. Now I was sweating through my linen shirt, watching a local nonna observe my reversing technique with the kind of silent judgment that only Italian grandmothers can perfect.

The villa, when I finally found it tucked behind an olive grove, made the chaos worthwhile. My host, Marco, appeared with a cold beer and the patient expression of a man who had watched many Britons arrive flustered. The property sat on the lower slopes of the Alban Hills, and from the terrace I could see the plain stretching toward Rome, hazy and golden in the afternoon heat. The pool gleamed turquoise. I had plans, I told Marco. Coastal walks. The Via Prenestina to the ancient ruins. Perhaps a stroll to Lake Albano before dinner.

"Ah," he said, in that particular Italian way that means you have said something charmingly naive. "Tomorrow, maybe we see about the weather."

I woke to a sky the colour of old pewter and a wind that rattled the shutters. My phone showed thirty-two degrees in Ostia, where I had intended to hike the pine-needled paths above the sea. Here in the hills, barely twenty miles inland, it was eighteen and dropping. The coastal walk would have meant driving through a storm to reach sunshine, and something about that felt philosophically wrong for a holiday. I made coffee and stood on the terrace, watching clouds scud across the valley, and felt the particular embarrassment of the over-planner confronted with reality.

By mid-morning the rain had passed, leaving a freshness that felt almost apologetic. I walked into Grottaferrata town instead, along lanes where the wet stone smelled of dust and thyme. The Basilica di San Nilo emerged suddenly from a tangle of medieval streets, its rose-coloured facade glowing against the grey sky. I wandered without purpose, which is not my natural state, and found it suited me better than I expected. A caffe corretto in a bar where the barman ignored my pronunciation with kindness. A slow climb past villas half-hidden behind umbrella pines, their gardens dripping and green.

The afternoon brought proper warmth, the kind that makes you grateful for shade. I walked the wooded paths above the town, where the ground was soft with pine needles and the air carried resin and wild mint. Every so often a break in the trees offered a view: the lake glinting below, the distant shimmer where the sea must be. I had wanted the drama of coastal cliffs, the particular theatre of waves against rock. Instead I had this quieter performance, the rustle of leaves, my own footsteps, the occasional startled lizard.

That evening I cooked badly with local ingredients, drank too much Frascati, and sat out as the sky cleared to show stars I had forgotten existed. The weather had not cooperated with my ambitions. I had walked perhaps eight miles through woodland and town, never reaching the coast I had planned to conquer. And I found, with the gentle surprise that only comes when you stop forcing things, that I did not mind at all. Some holidays teach you about places. This one, in its small and stubborn way, was teaching me something about the difference between an itinerary and an experience.

The next morning I woke early, pulled on walking shoes, and set off toward the lake without checking the forecast. The path was damp, the air already warming, and somewhere ahead I could hear a cockerel announcing his territory to the hills.