Ben Tianavaig by Mini_Webb

Possibly you could have used a flash. This sounds strange, however it would've lit up the trees, showing their details, giving colour to the image, whilst also leading the eye in. As the trees are quite far away, they wouldn't have been the only subject of the image lit up, resulting in the rest being quite dark.
You have to ask yourself the question "what am I trying to convey in this image and therefore where do I want the focus to be?"
I think the subject you want to highlight in this shot is the house on the water's edge. So you want to focus on that. You have been lucky enough to have the rays of light heading towards this subject, really leading the eye in. With the hills acting as a silhouettes, you could slightly burn them and really increase the contrast to the light.

Hope this helps!

Ollie