I should have known the holiday was going to be interesting when I missed the turning for Heinkenszand not once but three times. Sat-nav Sally, as I have unkindly named her, seemed convinced I wanted to visit a farm shop near Goes instead of the actual village. By the time I finally spotted the sign, I had seen enough of the Zeeland countryside to write a small book and was developing an intimate relationship with a particular roundabout.

The cottage itself appeared down a narrow lane that I nearly drove straight past, which would have been my fourth error of the morning. It sat there looking terribly Dutch and terribly sensible, all whitewashed walls and a roof that seemed to shrug at the grey sky. I tumbled out of the car, stretched my legs, and immediately stepped in a puddle that was deeper than it looked. My left trainer made a squelching noise for the rest of the afternoon that I chose to find charming rather than annoying.

I had planned to unpack properly, make a cup of tea, perhaps consult a leaflet about local attractions. Instead I found myself wandering, still damp of foot, down a path behind the cottage that I assumed must lead somewhere interesting. This is the thing about Heinkenszand and the surrounding polder landscape: the flatness tricks you into thinking you can see everything coming. You cannot.

The path became a track, the track became a grassy strip between two fields, and suddenly I was standing at the edge of something I later learned was the Oosterschelde's quieter inland reach. No dramatic cliffs, no tourist boards, just water and sky and the distant sound of what I desperately hoped was a bird and not my stomach. I had not brought snacks. I had not brought water. I had, in my enthusiasm, not even brought my phone. There was something gloriously foolish about it.

I walked further, because turning back seemed like admitting defeat, and found a small harbour that does not appear to have a name, or at least not one that anyone has bothered to put on a map. A man was mending nets outside a shed that smelled powerfully of fish and something else I could not identify. He nodded at me. I nodded back. We did not speak, which felt like the correct Dutch approach to the situation.

The afternoon became a series of these accidental discoveries. A bench facing nowhere in particular, positioned perfectly for watching clouds move across water. A tiny bridge over a drainage channel where someone had tied a rope swing that looked both ancient and recently used. A stand of trees that blocked the wind just enough to make sitting on the grass feel like a reasonable life choice.

By the time I stumbled back toward the cottage, the light was doing that golden thing it does in late afternoon, and my squelching trainer had mostly dried out. I passed a woman cycling with a dog in her front basket, both of them looking at me with identical expressions of mild curiosity. I waved. The dog did not wave back, which I respected.

That evening I sat in the cottage's small garden with a supermarket beer and watched the sky turn properly dark, something I never bother with at home. The polder had no dramatic views, no peaks or valleys to frame the experience. Just flat land and the sense that I had accidentally found exactly what I needed: permission to be slightly lost, slightly unprepared, and entirely present in a place that asked nothing of me except that I keep walking and see what turned up.

I still do not know the name of that harbour. I am not entirely certain I could find it again. This feels, somehow, like the point.