I have never been so relieved to see a wooden cabin in my life. Six hours after leaving Oslo, two missed turnings, one argument with a sat nav that insisted "Flabygd" was pronounced "Flab-ig-id", and a spectacular moment where I dropped an entire bag of wine gums down the passenger footwell, we finally crunched onto the gravel drive.

The wine gums were a casualty of excitement, or perhaps of the final hairpin bend that sent them flying. I spent a good five minutes on my hands and knees retrieving them from beneath the seat, emerging with a dusty handful and what I can only describe as a profound sense of personal failure. My partner found this hilarious. I did not, though I did eat the wine gums anyway. Five-second rule, extended generously for rural Norway.

The cabin sat among birch trees just beginning to turn, with Telemark's characteristic rolling hills rising behind it. Proper fairy-tale stuff, except fairies probably do not have to worry about whether they've packed enough socks. The air smelled of pine and woodsmoke from somewhere distant, and the silence was so complete that I actually said "blimey" out loud, which made my partner laugh again.

The key was exactly where the property notes said: a small metal box near the woodshed. I felt disproportionately proud of finding it, as if I'd cracked some ancient code rather than simply following instructions. The door opened with a satisfying heft, and we stepped into warmth that smelled faintly of cedar and clean linen.

I shall be honest: I had worried. You see these places online, all angled photography and promises of "authentic character", and you wonder if reality will involve a drafty box with a suspicious kettle. But the living room had proper wooden beams, actual beams you could look at and think, yes, those are structurally necessary, not decorative nonsense. A wood-burning stove squatted in the corner like a promise of future cosiness. I immediately began planning which evening would deserve lighting it. All of them, probably. I am not difficult to please.

The kitchen window looked directly onto nothing but trees and a glimpse of the valley below. I stood there with a glass of water, feeling smug about my life choices in a way that only holiday accommodation can induce. The wine gum incident began to feel like ancient history, or at least like charming anecdote material rather than genuine low point.

There was a small terrace with wooden furniture that had clearly weathered many Telemark winters. I pictured morning coffee there, perhaps wrapped in something sensible, watching mist rise from whatever lay beyond the trees. My partner pointed out that I was doing that thing where I narrate an idealised future version of the holiday rather than actually unpacking. Fair criticism. I unpacked.

By evening, with the wine gums mostly gone and a local beer from the village shop opened, I sat on the sofa and listened to nothing. Absolute nothing. No traffic, no planes, no neighbour's television bleeding through walls. Just the occasional creak of the cabin settling, and somewhere outside, what I chose to believe was an owl rather than a suspicious branch.

The sat nav had been wrong about the pronunciation, wrong about the third turning, and arguably wrong about my ability to "make a U-turn where possible." But sitting there, slightly sticky from rescued confectionery, I forgave it everything.