I have never been brilliant with directions, so it will surprise absolutely no one that I managed to get us lost before we even reached Chiavari. There we were, winding through Liguria's terraced hills in a hire car the size of a biscuit tin, when I confidently ignored the satnav and followed a sign that looked, to my sun-addled brain, extremely promising. It was not promising. It was a dead end at somebody's lemon grove, where an elderly gentleman in a faded cap watched us perform a seventeen-point turn with the kind of patience that suggested he had seen this many times before. My partner sat in silence. I laughed too loudly. We eventually found the proper road.

The property sat tucked into a hillside just above the town, a proper Ligurian house with shuttered windows and that faded terracotta glow you see on postcards but never quite believe is real. I had worried it might feel too polished, too rental-by-numbers, but the moment I stepped onto the terrace and saw the olive trees trembling in the warm breeze, I felt that particular holiday loosening in my shoulders. You know the one. Where you actually exhale.

We had arrived in late May, armed with ambitious walking plans and waterproofs we absolutely would not need. Liguria in spring, we told each other, would be perfect coastal hiking weather. The Cinque Terre paths, the promenades between villages, the whole glorious stretch of Italian Riviera unfolding at our feet. I had even packed proper walking boots, which is unprecedented for me and should have been a warning sign.

The first morning dawned bright and already warm. We set off from Chiavari's harbour, following the lungomare eastward with the sea winking beside us. Fishermen were mending nets in that methodical way that makes you feel lazy for merely watching. The path climbed gradually through pines and past painted houses, the air thick with rosemary and that particular salt-heat mix that only really exists by the Mediterranean. We made it to Lavagna before the temperature did something dramatic. The kind of jump that has you stopping in a patch of shade, staring at your companion with the realisation that perhaps boots were a miscalculation.

By midday, the coastal path had become an exercise in strategic shade-hopping. We abandoned our original plan to push on towards Sestri Levante and instead collapsed at a beach bar in Cavi, where I drank two lemon granitas in quick succession and considered whether my feet had actually swollen inside my footwear. They had. I could feel them pulsing with each heartbeat, little traitors in leather coffins.

The weather had other ideas for our entire week. Each morning brought that same building heat, the sun climbing with what felt like personal aggression. Our carefully researched hiking routes, the ones I had bookmarked with such enthusiasm, became theoretical exercises. We would set out early, make admirable progress, then find ourselves defeated by midday, retreating to cooler ground.

What we discovered, though, was Chiavari itself. The covered arcades of the old town, where the temperature dropped blessedly and shopkeepers sold everything from handmade pasta to sandals that actually let your feet breathe. I bought a pair in desperation on day three and have never made a better purchase. We walked the town's network of caruggi, those narrow Ligurian lanes where the buildings lean together like conspirators, finding churches and sudden piazzas and a bakery that made focaccia so good I actually teared up slightly.

The heat forced a slower pace, a different rhythm. Morning walks along the promenade before the sun properly woke up, watching the elderly men in their impeccable shirts stroll with hands clasped behind their backs. Afternoons on our terrace with books and the occasional doze, the cicadas providing their relentless soundtrack. Evenings when the temperature finally relented and we could wander down to Chiavari's harbour for dinner, watching the lights come on across the water.

One morning we did manage a proper hike, setting out at an hour that felt almost criminal, the sky still soft and pink. We followed a path up through olive groves above the town, the sea spreading below us in that particular Ligurian blue that seems almost artificial. By the time we reached a small chapel perched on the hillside, the sun had found us again, but we had earned our retreat. We sat on the steps and shared warm water from my bottle, watching the heat haze begin to rise from the coast.

I had wanted a walking holiday, the active kind you describe to colleagues with a certain smugness. What I got was something more meandering, more accidental. The weather forced me to abandon my plans, and in doing so, showed me what I might have marched straight past. There is a lesson there, I suspect, about my general approach to life, but I was too busy eating gelato to fully interrogate it.

On our final evening, we walked slowly along Chiavari's beach as the sun dropped towards the horizon, the heat finally releasing its grip. My cheap sandals made their familiar slap against the promenade. Somewhere behind us, the hills we had half-climbed and abandoned stood green and indifferent. I felt no particular need to conquer them. The lemon grove dead end, the swollen feet, the abandoned hiking routes, the granitas in Cavi, the discovery of a town I might never have properly seen, all of it had become the holiday itself. I would not have planned it this way. I am rather glad I did not have to.