I had been driving for what felt like three days but was probably closer to seven hours when I realised my phone charger was still plugged into the wall of my flat in Manchester. This discovery came precisely as my sat nav died somewhere near Drammen, leaving me with nothing but a crumpled printout of directions and the sort of blind optimism that only a person who has already paid for a non-refundable cabin can muster.

The mishap that really defines this trip, though, happened about twenty minutes from my destination. I stopped at a petrol station to ask for directions to Rajekollen in Kongsberg, and in my exhausted state I managed to walk straight into the automatic door before it had fully opened. The bloke behind the counter didn't even flinch. Just handed me a coffee and said, "British?" in a tone that suggested this was not an uncommon occurrence.

The final stretch into Buskerud was something else entirely. The road wound through pine forests that seemed to grow taller and more judgmental with every mile, as if they were silently observing my questionable life choices. The light was doing that magical Norwegian thing where everything looks slightly golden and unreal, which I later learned is just called "late afternoon" when you are this far north and it is not permanently dark.

I found the turn for Rajekollen by spotting a red postbox that matched the owner's description. This felt like a genuine achievement. I may have pumped my fist. There was nobody around to witness this, which was probably for the best.

The cabin sat on a gentle slope with a view I was not remotely prepared for. Fjord country, apparently, does not mess about when it comes to first impressions. The water below was that particular shade of grey-blue that makes you understand why people paint landscapes. I stood there with my car door open, one foot still inside, just staring like a complete idiot until a gust of wind reminded me that I was losing body heat rapidly.

Getting inside involved a small battle with a lockbox that I definitely won through persistence rather than skill. The key turned with a satisfying clunk and I stepped into warmth and the faint smell of woodsmoke that clings to proper Norwegian cabins. Someone had left the heating on low, which struck me as an almost unbearably kind gesture from a stranger.

The living area was all timber walls and practical furniture, the sort of place where you immediately feel you should be wearing thick socks and drinking something hot. I am not a spiritual person, but there was something about that first moment of stillness, after the engine noise and the door collision and the navigational panic, that felt like a small exhalation. I had done it. I was here. I was also starving, slightly hypothermic, and in desperate need of a functioning phone charger, but I was here.

I made tea with the sort of concentration usually reserved for defusing bombs, then sat by the window as the last light disappeared and the first stars emerged over the pines. The fjord had vanished into darkness, but I could hear it somewhere below, water moving against rock in a rhythm that sounded almost like breathing.

Tomorrow I would explore properly. Tonight I would sit in my borrowed sanctuary, nursing my tea and my bruised dignity, already knowing that the story of the petrol station door would be told at every dinner party for the next decade.