The drive up to Trysil had been going suspiciously well until I realised, somewhere past Elverum, that I'd left my walking boots on the kitchen table in St Albans. There they sat, probably enjoying a nice cup of tea without me, while I was heading into the Norwegian interior with nothing but a pair of canvas trainers and a growing sense of foolishness. My partner found this hilarious for approximately the first hour, then grew rather quiet as the reality of muddy forest paths settled upon us both.

We were visiting in late September, that liminal season when summer has definitely finished its business but winter hasn't quite worked up the courage to arrive. The birch trees along Route 25 were turning the most extraordinary butter yellow, whole hillsides glowing as if someone had gone at them with a giant highlighter. It was, I kept remarking, absolutely spectacular. My partner kept remarking that my canvas trainers were going to be absolutely spectacularly ruined.

The property sat on the edge of Trysilfjellet, one of those Norwegian wooden cabins that manages to look both rustic and improbably well-constructed. Ours was the sort of place where you half expect to find a friendly troll in the woodshed, though in late September the woodshed was stacked high with birch logs and the trolls were presumably still on their summer holidays. The air had that particular autumn quality to it, sharp and metallic, carrying the faint smell of leaf mould and distant woodsmoke from neighbouring cabins. I stood on the deck breathing it in, watching my breath cloud in the morning air, and felt that particular satisfaction of having arrived somewhere that actually feels different from home.

What struck me immediately was how the season seemed to have paused the entire mountain. The ski lifts stood silent and slightly forlorn, their chairs hanging empty against the grey sky. The mountain bike trails were empty too, though here and there we spotted patches of worn earth where summer visitors had carved their enthusiasm into the landscape. Late September in Trysil is neither one thing nor another, and there's something honest about that. The place doesn't pretend to be something it isn't. No artificial jollity, no forced winter cosiness. Just the mountain, the trees, and the quiet business of seasonal transition.

I spent the first afternoon wandering the immediate area in my inadequate footwear, stepping carefully around the wetter patches. The ground was carpeted with fallen birch leaves, each one seemingly determined to be more golden than its neighbour. The low sun, already sliding towards the horizon by mid-afternoon, caught them at an angle that made the whole forest floor appear to glow from within. I found a small lake, perhaps ten minutes' walk from the cabin, its surface perfectly still and reflecting the darkening sky with the kind of precision that makes you check whether you've accidentally wandered into a painting.

That evening, we lit the wood-burning stove for the first time. The cabin took on that particular autumn atmosphere, the one where the cold pressing against the windows somehow makes the warmth inside feel more deliberate, more earned. I sat with my feet towards the flames, still in damp canvas trainers, and considered the particular foolishness of travelling without proper boots. There was something almost comforting about it, this small failure, this reminder that I am perpetually slightly underprepared for the natural world. The Norwegians, I suspect, do not forget their walking boots. The Norwegians probably have a special cupboard just for seasonal footwear, each pair labelled and ready. But then, perhaps being slightly underprepared has its own rewards, forcing a slower pace, a more attentive step, a greater awareness of where exactly you're placing each foot.

The darkness came early, as it does at that latitude in late September, and with it came a profound silence broken only by the occasional crack from the stove. Through the window, I could just make out the pale shapes of birch trunks in the gloom, and above them, emerging gradually as my eyes adjusted, more stars than I was properly accustomed to seeing. The seasonal shift had stripped the leaves from the upper branches, opening windows in the canopy through which the sky pressed in. It felt, in that moment, like the mountain was making its autumn offer: less comfort, perhaps, than summer or winter might provide, but a particular kind of clarity in exchange, a stripping back to essentials.

I went to bed that night with my trainers drying on the stove hearth and a new pair of proper boots ordered online for collection in Trysil town, and fell asleep to the sound of wind moving through the remaining leaves, that particular autumn rustling that sounds almost, but not quite, like rainfall.