I have never been so grateful to see a wooden shed in all my life. Three hours of driving from Karlstad, two wrong turns caused by me smugly insisting I knew better than the sat nav, and one spectacular incident involving a thermos of coffee and my own lap later, I finally rolled up to our little stuga in Saffle just as the October light was starting to fade.

The journey itself had been textbook autumnal Sweden. The E18 was a tunnel of gold and copper, birch trees shedding their leaves in that half-hearted way they do, as if they cannot quite commit to letting go. I had the heating on full blast and the windows cracked open because I am apparently incapable of choosing one temperature and sticking to it. The coffee incident happened near Kil, at a roundabout that looked perfectly straightforward on the map but turned out to involve some creative lane discipline. I am still finding dried droplets on my jacket lining.

But then there it was. Red paint, white trim, the whole Scandinavian fantasy sat among trees that were doing their best impression of a bonfire without actually burning down. The key was in the lockbox, which I opened with the code after only two failed attempts and some muttering that I shall not repeat. The door stuck slightly, swollen from recent rain, and I shouldered it like a burglar with a legitimate booking confirmation.

Inside smelled of pine and something else I could not place. Clean, but not hotel clean. More like someone had opened all the windows that morning and let the season itself move in. The October dusk was doing that thing where it arrives suddenly, not like the gradual English gloom I am used to, but with a sort of theatrical finality. One moment you can see the lake through the trees, the next you are squinting at your own hand.

I fumbled for light switches and found them in places that made no sense to my British sensibilities. The kitchen light was behind the fridge. Obviously. The main room came alive in stages, revealing itself like a developing photograph. Wooden beams I had not noticed. A stove that looked serious enough to demand respect. Windows that were already collecting condensation from my damp arrival, fogging the view of whatever lay beyond.

I had planned to unpack properly, to establish order, to be the sort of person who hangs clothes immediately. Instead I stood in the middle of the room with my rucksack still on, listening. The silence was not empty. It had texture. Somewhere, water. Closer, the tick of cooling metal from the car. Then a gust against the window, and the realisation that the trees were moving more than I had thought, that the weather was turning in a way I had not dressed for.

The heating system required a degree in Swedish engineering, or at least the ability to read instructions I had not thought to photograph. I pressed buttons hopefully. Something whirred. A radiator in the corner made a promising clicking sound, then fell silent, then clicked again with what felt like passive aggression. I decided we were communicating and left it at that.

By full dark I had achieved a cup of tea using a kettle that took approximately one Swedish crime drama episode to boil, and I sat on the small sofa with my feet not quite reaching the floor because Scandinavian furniture assumes longer legs than mine. The windows were now proper black, not city black with ambient glow, but the thick absence of light you forget exists until you are surrounded by forest and lake and whatever else the morning would reveal.

I thought about the coffee stain spreading across my trousers. I thought about the drive still to come, the food I had not bought, the fact that I had packed three novels and no torch. The season pressed against the glass, October making its presence known, and I felt that particular combination of foolishness and luck that seems to define my better holidays.

Morning would bring the lake properly, and the walking paths, and probably some humbling encounter with local wildlife or local grocery opening hours. For now, there was tea, and the slow warming of a room, and the particular satisfaction of having arrived somewhere that did not immediately feel like anywhere else I had been.

The radiator clicked once more, definitively this time, and I chose to believe it was welcoming me.