The drive up from Mora took longer than expected, mostly because I confidently ignored the satnav and decided I knew a "better" route. Forty minutes of increasingly narrow forest tracks later, I found myself nose-to-nose with a very large moose who looked at me with the kind of weary disappointment usually reserved for my mother. We stared at each other for what felt like an hour. I reversed two miles back to the main road with my tail firmly between my legs, arriving at the saelen just as the autumn light was beginning to fade.

September in Dalarna is not messing about. The trees had turned practically overnight, or so it seemed to my city-dulled eyes. The saelen sat among birches and pines that were throwing off gold and copper like they were trying to win some sort of foliage competition. The wooden exterior had that deep, weathered red you see on all the proper Swedish houses, and smoke was already curling from the chimney stack. Someone had been round to light the stove beforehand, which I later learned was standard for autumn arrivals. In summer, apparently, you fend for yourself and any mosquitoes. In September, they take pity on you.

I dumped my bags in the hallway and immediately made for the lake path behind the property. The ground was soft with fallen leaves, and the air carried that particular cold snap that promises frost by morning but hasn't quite committed to it yet. The lake itself was mirror-still, reflecting the last of the sunset in a way that made me stop and actually say "blimey" out loud. I don't think I'd said "blimey" since about 2004. There's something about Swedish autumn light that strips away your cool, urban vocabulary and reduces you to words your grandmother would use.

Back at the saelen, I discovered my first proper mistake. In my enthusiasm for the whole Nordic experience, I'd brought a bag of logs from a petrol station near Mora. The saelen, of course, had a full woodshed stacked with properly seasoned birch. My petrol station logs were apparently the firewood equivalent of bringing a sandwich to a banquet. I used them anyway, out of stubbornness, and spent the evening listening to them hiss and pop like an angry kettle while the proper birch in the woodshed sat there in silent judgement.

The darkness came down hard and fast, as it does at that latitude in late September. By seven it felt like midnight. I kept finding myself at the windows, mug of tea in hand, watching the stars emerge in a sky that seemed to have more of them than I was accustomed to. The city has stolen the night from me, I realised. I had forgotten what actual darkness looked like, the kind that makes you reach for a torch just to walk to the woodshed.

Morning brought frost on the grass and a lake steaming slightly in the early sun. I walked down to the small jetty, boots crunching, and sat there with coffee until my fingers went numb. A couple of local lads were already out in a rowing boat, checking fishing lines. They waved. I waved back, feeling briefly like I belonged, which of course I absolutely did not.

The seasonal shift was the whole story, really. That saelen in summer would be a different creature entirely - swimming and barbecues and midnight sun and probably those mosquitoes. In deep winter, it would be snow up to the windows and skiing and the aurora if you were lucky. But this in-between time, this gathering-in, suited me more than I expected. The world felt paused, holding its breath before winter proper arrived.

I spent three days doing very little of consequence. Walked the forest paths before the leaves fell completely. Collected mushrooms I couldn't identify and left them where I found them. Read half a novel by the fire. Ate herring from a jar and pretended I enjoyed it more than I did.

On the last morning, I woke to find the first proper frost had painted the windows from the outside. I scraped a peephole and watched the lake through it, everything sharp and silver and waiting. The saelen had warmed through now, the wood stove ticking as it cooled, the whole place smelling of pine and old timber and something else I couldn't name. Comfort, perhaps. Or the particular comfort of being somewhere that knows exactly what season it is and makes no apology for it.

I left the woodshed key on the hook, took one last walk to say goodbye to the moose-less track, and drove back to Mora with the heating on full and a new appreciation for simply arriving at the right time, even if I did take the wrong road to get there.