I have never been so happy to see a swimming pool in my life, and that includes the time I nearly fell into one at a wedding in Torquay. But I am getting ahead of myself.

The journey to Castalla started well enough. My partner and I flew into Valencia, picked up our hire car, and felt terribly organised. Too organised, perhaps. We had printed directions, a playlist of Spanish guitar music, and a bag of lemon bonbons for emergencies. What we did not have, as it turned out, was any grasp of Spanish road signage or a sat nav that recognised the address of our holiday home. Somewhere near the town of Onil, the sat nav decided we were actually headed to a furniture factory. We were not. We were headed to a small winding road that grew progressively narrower until I found myself reversing past a goat who looked deeply unimpressed with my driving.

By the time we reached the Castalla property, I had eaten the entire bag of lemon bonbons and developed a twitch in my left eye. But then we turned through the gates, and there it was. A low, honey-coloured villa with a private pool glinting in the afternoon sun, surrounded by terracotta pots and the kind of quiet that makes you realise how loudly you have been breathing.

The mishap, though. I must tell you about the mishap.

In my eagerness to claim a sun lounger, I attempted what I can only describe as a running dismount from the car. My flip-flop caught on the door frame. I stumbled forward with the grace of a newborn giraffe, arms windmilling, and came within a hair's breadth of launching myself fully clothed into the pool. My partner captured this on video, naturally. I have watched it seventeen times. Each time I look slightly more ridiculous.

But here is the thing. That near-calamity set the tone for the entire fortnight. I realised, standing there with one wet trainer and my dignity in tatters, that I was absolutely not in charge anymore. The villa was in charge. The sunshine was in charge. The slow, lazy rhythm of Castalla was firmly in charge, and I was merely a passenger.

The days that followed were gloriously unambitious. We would wake without alarms, make coffee in the little kitchen with its terracotta tiles, and carry our cups outside to watch the light change on the hills. The pool became our headquarters. I read three novels that had been sitting on my shelf since 2019. Three! I cannot tell you the plot of a single one, but I remember the feeling of warm pages and the sound of bees in the lavender nearby.

We did venture out, of course, but never far. The town of Castalla itself is small and unhurried, with a castle perched above it that we walked up to one morning when the temperature was still forgiving. Mostly, though, our exploration extended to the local supermarket for bread and tomatoes, or the occasional evening stroll to find somewhere for tapas. We found a place where the owner brought us dishes we had not ordered, simply because he thought we should try them. He was correct.

I have never been very good at doing nothing. My brain likes a to-do list, a schedule, a sense of productive achievement. But something about that villa, that pool, that particular quality of light, wore me down in the best possible way. By day five, I was napping without guilt. By day ten, I had forgotten what day it was. By day twelve, I genuinely considered whether I could live on tomatoes, olive oil, and the occasional swim forever.

The journey home was less eventful, though I did clutch the steering wheel rather tighter than necessary when we passed the furniture factory again. My partner played the video of my poolside stumble. I laughed, properly laughed, and felt something in my chest loosen.

I am back now, in grey England, with my to-do lists and my deadlines. But I keep the video on my phone. Sometimes I watch it when the rain is coming down sideways. It reminds me that there is a place where the only thing required of me was to slow down, to float, to let the sun do its work. And to be grateful that the goat, at least, never told anyone what he saw.