Dr. Xikar
The Knife Doctor
Well, as many of you know (okay, at most three of you know... Jack :rolling
I've recently returned from a trip south of the border. My family went to Cozumel (an island near Cancun), Mexico for Christmas :smokingme
Well, While I was there I picked up my first ever Cuban (I actually stumbled onto an LCDH... See, I went to their site to use the Building Locator, and it showed that there weren't any in Cozumel... So I was sad... As soon as I stepped off of the ferry from Cancun to Cozumel, BAM, right in front of me was the big La Casa Del Habano sign! Win!)
My first was a short Cohiba Robusto... It was admittedly overhumidified fresh off the rack, so it had some burn issues and the taste left a bit to be desired, But there are a few factors to that one: Damp cigar, I had just had some pop about a half hour prior, etc. Still a damn good smoke though, but not a good enough experience yet.
So, there's the good, here's the bad... Fakes. They were everywhere, and I knew, for the most part, what to look for. And yet I still ended up getting two fakes along the way... LCDH was closed and my brother had talked me into tossing back two quite large Long Island Iced Teas (in other words, bowls of Tequila with a dash of coke). Suddenly I was face to face with some very real looking Cohibas (Upon inspection the next day [Comparing them side to side with real ones from LCDH] They seem to have real Cohiba bands, or incredibly accurate forgeries, moved onto fake cigars.) The fakes are very well constructed, clean caps, minimal veins, attractive wrapper leaves. What gave it away was that some of the tobacco flaked out of the bottom - extremely short filler. I promptly cut the cigar open, realizing what I had and, yep, no long leaves. So I smoked another one bought from the same guy... Plugged, and terrible tasting.
Whine whine moan ... Sorry for rambling on so long!
I ended up leaving with 4 cubans to go in the Humi for a while/waiting for special occasions. Cohiba, Cohiba Maduro, Trinidad and a RyJ Limited Release, all four compliments of LCDH.
At least now I know more about spotting a fake and, more importantly, a DEALER of fakes, and have a few reals.
PS - Cozumel is pretty damn awesome, I burnt through a lot of really good sticks there :ccool:
Your brother,
Jeremy
I've recently returned from a trip south of the border. My family went to Cozumel (an island near Cancun), Mexico for Christmas :smokingmeWell, While I was there I picked up my first ever Cuban (I actually stumbled onto an LCDH... See, I went to their site to use the Building Locator, and it showed that there weren't any in Cozumel... So I was sad... As soon as I stepped off of the ferry from Cancun to Cozumel, BAM, right in front of me was the big La Casa Del Habano sign! Win!)
My first was a short Cohiba Robusto... It was admittedly overhumidified fresh off the rack, so it had some burn issues and the taste left a bit to be desired, But there are a few factors to that one: Damp cigar, I had just had some pop about a half hour prior, etc. Still a damn good smoke though, but not a good enough experience yet.
So, there's the good, here's the bad... Fakes. They were everywhere, and I knew, for the most part, what to look for. And yet I still ended up getting two fakes along the way... LCDH was closed and my brother had talked me into tossing back two quite large Long Island Iced Teas (in other words, bowls of Tequila with a dash of coke). Suddenly I was face to face with some very real looking Cohibas (Upon inspection the next day [Comparing them side to side with real ones from LCDH] They seem to have real Cohiba bands, or incredibly accurate forgeries, moved onto fake cigars.) The fakes are very well constructed, clean caps, minimal veins, attractive wrapper leaves. What gave it away was that some of the tobacco flaked out of the bottom - extremely short filler. I promptly cut the cigar open, realizing what I had and, yep, no long leaves. So I smoked another one bought from the same guy... Plugged, and terrible tasting.
Whine whine moan ... Sorry for rambling on so long!
I ended up leaving with 4 cubans to go in the Humi for a while/waiting for special occasions. Cohiba, Cohiba Maduro, Trinidad and a RyJ Limited Release, all four compliments of LCDH.
At least now I know more about spotting a fake and, more importantly, a DEALER of fakes, and have a few reals.
PS - Cozumel is pretty damn awesome, I burnt through a lot of really good sticks there :ccool:
Your brother,
Jeremy
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