I have never been very good at reading the small print on satnav instructions, which is how I ended up driving our hire car down what I can only describe as a goat track somewhere north of Perugia, convinced I was taking the scenic route to Citta di Castello. The scenic route, it turned out, was actually a farm track bordered by olive groves that looked centuries old, and the only thing separating us from a very awkward phone call to the rental company was my partner's sudden interest in prayer. We reversed for nearly half a mile while a local farmer watched from his tractor with the kind of patient amusement that suggested he had seen this many times before.

By the time we found the proper road, the late October afternoon was already softening into that particular golden light you only seem to get in Umbria. The summer crowds had long gone, taking with them the heat and the hustle, and what remained felt almost conspiratorially peaceful. I had worried that coming out of season might mean shuttered shops and a general air of hibernation, but I had not accounted for how the autumn transforms the place entirely.

The property sat on the edge of town, a solid stone farmhouse that looked like it had grown straight out of the hillside rather than been built upon it. The garden was in that glorious state of productive decay that October brings, tomatoes still clinging to yellowing vines, lavender gone woody and silver, everything smelling of woodsmoke and damp earth. Our host had left a basket on the kitchen table, figs so ripe they were practically begging to be eaten immediately, a bottle of local wine, and a note explaining that the olive harvest would begin the following week and would we mind terribly if the neighbouring farmer needed access to the lower terrace? We did not mind at all. There is something about being trusted with the rhythms of a place that makes you feel less like a tourist and more like a temporary local.

The evenings came early, as they do at that time of year, and with them a chill that sent us hunting for blankets and making friends with the wood-burning stove. I had packed for Italian weather with the optimistic wardrobe of someone who once visited Rome in April, which is to say entirely inadequately. My partner, who had actually checked the forecast, watched me layer every item of clothing I owned with the expression of someone who knows better than to say "I told you so" but is definitely thinking it very loudly.

What struck me most was how the season shaped every small decision. Mornings began slowly, wrapped in mist that clung to the Tiber valley until the sun burned through around ten. We walked into town for coffee not because we needed caffeine but because the exercise warmed us up, and because the passeggiata still happened even in October, even when the numbers were thinner, even when everyone wore coats. The baker knew our order by the third day, which felt like an achievement I had not earned but was happy to accept.

There is a particular humility that comes from travelling when a place is not trying to impress you. The swimming pool was covered and still, the garden furniture stacked under tarpaulin, the tourist office operating reduced hours. Yet what we lost in convenience we gained in something harder to name, a sense of witnessing the place as it actually lived rather than as it performed for visitors. I found myself thinking about my own rhythms at home, how rarely I adjusted to the season rather than fighting against it, how often I reached for artificial light and constant temperature rather than letting the world outside shape my days.

On our final morning, frost silvered the rosemary bushes and our breath hung visible in the air. We packed the car with more care than we had arrived, and I took one last look at the valley stretching away towards the Apennines, the morning sun catching the last of the autumn colours. The farmer waved from his tractor as we passed, and I like to think there was something almost approving in it, as though we had passed some small test by simply showing up when things were quieter, when the place asked a little more of you and gave something different in return.