My father is a civil engineer and I spent a considerable amount of my childhood looking at reservoirs, motorway bridges and roundabouts.

What I remember most vividly about going to see them was less the structures themselves but the stories he told me about the people he worked with and the working environment. It conjured up a picture that even now I can still recall.

It is a trick I use all the time to remember the wines I have tasted and drunk. I try fantastically hard to record the taste of as many of the wines I encounter as possible.

It is not easy and, with many of them being remarkably average, it is essential to find a trigger to recall them.

Take this week; from a wine point of view. It began in a Spanish tapas restaurant in London where I was meeting a friend, fresh from her wine exams.

I arrived early and was sat outside in one of Soho’s busier streets. I ordered a glass of Verdejo and I remember very clearly the stem-less glass it was served in and the slightly dour waitress.

The wine was unremarkable. I remember how flat it looked in the glass and how aromatically neutral it seemed. I was not at all moved to drink it (though taste it, I did).

Later, with my colleague, we drank Rosado and we jointly mourned its blandness. Had these wines been in a line-up of others, I cannot think I would have given them a second thought. But, given the ‘occasion’, they are permanently etched on my mind.

You might think it is worthless but the advantage is that I will not make the mistake of ordering either wine again.

On a brighter note, I won my first ever riding competition on my young horse this week.

Arriving back at the stables, my (utterly fabulous) yard buddies had cracked open a bottle of Lanson Rosé champagne to celebrate.

It is not my favourite sparkling wine by any stretch of the imagination but I am unlikely to forget exactly how it looked and tasted; so special was the day.

I should also be honest and tell you how much better it tasted as a result of my positive mood.

A few days later and I find myself tasting some wines that are comparatively new to the UK.

The representative sidles alongside me to read my notes as I write; he talks at me, rather than to me and then completely ignores me as soon as someone more famous turns up. I know I am paid to be objective but sometimes it is really, really difficult.

Smell and tastes are incredibly evocative for me and my week finished well when I opened up a bottle of Haskell Vineyards Dombeya Sauvignon Blanc 2008 (£7.95 from Lea and Sandeman).

It is a wine I tasted when visiting this winery in South Africa last year and was bowled over by the quality of everything female winemaker, Rianie Strydom was making.

Revisiting the wine took me right back to the spotlessly clean winery; the embarrassingly squeaky leather chairs in the tasting area and the delights of tasting her most recent Shiraz from tank.

It may not have been the outcome my father was expecting but those reservoir visits taught me something.

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