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December 28, 2025 · 10:19 am

Trinidad and Las Calaveras Cigars and a Giveaway!

It’s a busy time of the year and Christmas on a Thursday really threw off my week.  I had to go out yesterday and buy some new-to-me cigars for today’s post.  I also decided at the last minute to half-ass a giveaway!  More on the giveaway after I talk about a couple cigars.I ran into Cigar Mojo – The Grove, and found a few cigars that I haven’t smoked yet. This is an interesting problem to have, but I’m having trouble finding the combination of cigars I haven’t smoked, and cigars I want to smoke.  It’s come to me going through the humidor with my phone searching my own website to make sure I’m not repeating. And then there’s some cigars I just don’t have any interest in smoking.  I’m also price sensitive, and they have quite a few pricey cigars in the humidor. It’s easy when I want to stop in for a smoke, but less so when I’m looking for something new to write about. Anyway, I grabbed a Trinidad Espiritu Miami since I hadn’t had that one yet.  This is the fourth cigar in the Espiritu line, I rather enjoy the No. 2 the most, but they have all been good.  I want to get a hold of the Tommy Bahama edition. This is a 6 1/8″ x 52 Belicoso, and is a Nicaraguan puro made at the A.J. Fernandez factory.  While this is inspired by Miami, it contains no Miami tobacco!  This is probably a good thing. The bright colors and art deco look of the bands was very appealing to me and seemed to go along with this festive time of year.  I quite enjoyed the hour and a half I spent with this cigar.  It burned and drew well, and had some sweet, bready sensations.  I didn’t think the wrapper would fall into the beautiful category, it was on the ugly side, with some mottling and an odd color. Smoking with your eyes isn’t limited to packaging.  I liked this cigar, it was medium bodied and quite enjoyable.  Once again, most times if I enjoy an Altadis cigar, it’s made by A.J. Fernandez.  

 

Another cigar I picked up was the Las Calaveras LE 2025 from Crowned Heads.  I selected the LC54 size which is 6″ x 54. This cigar has a mid-priming San Andrés wrapper that’s not your usual maduro wrapper, but Colorado in color.  I haven’t smoked too many of the Las Calaveras line in the past, but the ones I have I’ve enjoyed.  This one was also enjoyable.  I almost grabbed the 2024 (they have 2’23, ’24 and ’25 on the shelf) because the band has red and green in it and I’m still feeling Christmassy, but I went for the newest one instead.  Mojo is a mile away, I can always grab more.  These are made at the My Father factory. There is an earthy cocoa flavor with a little bit of spice. Interestingly, the first half of this cigar burned really fast,  I was maybe 20 minutes in when I started wondering if it was going to make it to thirty minutes.  At the halfway point it slowed down, and I got to somewhere around an hour and a quarter.  It finished off well, nice cigar. I’m thinking I may have to go grab a ’23 and ’24 next time I’m there. 

 

It’s a bit of a tradition around here to give stuff away around the holidays. I have some goodies lying around, so here’s what going to happen!  I have a neat Don Doroteo leather case, with a cutter and lighter. This is a really nice item, it’s just not something I’ll use. There’s a. J.C.Newman Bricktoberfest stein.  There’s a nice Villiger lighter.  I’ve had this silver plate Gurkha ashtray in my closet for a few years, it can use a little shining up, but it’s a nice ashtray. Ironically, I’ve heard that mixing some cigar ash with water makes a good silver polish.

 

Top that off with some miscellaneous goodies, along with at least a dozen cigars from my humidor which I’ll and pick, and you’ve got a pretty nice bunch of stuff.  So leave a comment here on this blog post.  Facebook comments, IG, Threads, X comments don’t count.  I look forward to reading your comments!  I’ll select a winner randomly next Sunday.  Good luck!

 

That’s all I have for today!  Happy New Year to all.  Until the next time, 

 

CigarCraig

 

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August 24, 2025 · 9:28 am

Saint Luis Rey and Drew Estate Free Style Live Cigars and a Giveaway!

I didn’t have a lot of new stuff to write about this week, so I figures a classic CigarCraig giveaway was long overdue.  Stuff has been piling up and it needs to find a new home!  More on that after I talk about a couple cigars!  First up is the Saint Luis Rey Natural Broadleaf Rothschild.  I’ve always liked the Saint Luis Rey brand, and really need to check out some of their newer offerings.  I remember when they were made for Altadis by the Eiroas, boy were they good back then!  This is a 5″ x 54 with a severe box press, not really a Rothschild at all.  Obviously, I would have gotten a toro had it been available, but this is what the shop had. I thought this was quite a nice cigar.  It had a rich, spicy sweetness, burned well and was very nice.  These should be around $7 each, so are a really good cigar at a great price. 

 

Drew Estate will be having a Freestyle Live event this Tuesday, 8/26/25, at 7 Eastern on YouTube and Facebook to reveal what the cigar in their most recent Freestyle Live pack will become.  The pack consisted of three cigars (all Toros), and a 40 ounce Tumbler.  I’ll be honest, previous FSL packs had a little more substance.  The tumbler is nice, I should probably use it myself, but it will be included in the giveaway below, along with some stuff from a previous FSL event.  The cigar is obviously a mystery for now.  I can tell you a few things about it, though.  It has a lighter wrapper, and may be a shade wrapper, based on what I perceived as a breaddy sweetness.  My money is on Nica Rustica Shade, but I’m never right about these things.  It’s a really good smoke, I’ll be delighted if it’s in the Nica Rustica price range.  The pack comes with three cigars, and is probably still available in retail, so it’s a good deal if you need a tumbler.  Tune in to Drew Estate’s broadcast Tuesday to find out what it is.  

 

OK, giveaway time!  I hope you read the paragraphs above and didn’t just scroll down to the free stuff section!  OK, you know how this works.   Leave a comment on this blog post to enter.  Not on Facebook, LinkedIn, X, Threads or anywhere else, just here.  I’ll select a winner at random and announce it in next Sunday’s post.  Here’s what I’m including, other stuff might fall in the box when I pack it up,  and I’m not listing cigars, but the humidor will be full of selections from my humidor.  First, from Drew Estate, there’s the Freestyle Live Tumbler (and a cigar), the ten count travel humidor from the last FSL event (which I will fill with cigars!), which includes a lighter.  Then there’s some various swag from last year’s Barnsmoker, a hat, spray can lighter (hard to believe I got that through TSA!) and cutter.  From J.C. Newman there’s a pair of Brick House Bricktoberfest pint glasses (stock photo since they are already nicely wrapped for shipping). I’m also including a melamine Romeo y Julieta ashtray, and, like I said, whatever I might find laying around in the meantime. 

Any cigars I include will have been featured on my site at some point, and or are personal favorites. They won’t suck.  So hit the comments, let me know what you think!  I just remembered, next week will be the 16th anniversary of CigarCraig.com, so there’s a good reason to celebrate with a giveaway! 

 

That’s all for today, until the next time, 

 

CigarCraig

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March 24, 2021 · 9:25 pm

Trinidad Espiritu No.2 Toro Cigar

I was out over the weekend looking for some specific cigars and couldn’t find them, so, being me and all, I couldn’t walk out of a cigar shop empty handed, so one of the cigars I picked up that was new to me was the Trinidad Espiritu No.2 in the Toro size. They had the Magnum and Robusto as well, but I like Toros, so

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that’s what I got! I’ll admit, there aren’t a great many cigars in the Altadis portfolio that I get excited about, but I’ve found in the last few years, the cigars that have been made in collaboration with A.J. Fernandez have been to my liking. This is such a cigar. 

 

The Trinidad Espiritu No.2 has a Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper, Nicaraguan binder and Nicaraguan and Brazilian fillers, and is a collaboration with Rafael Nodal and AJ Fernandez and, one assumes, made at A.J. Fernandez’ factory in Esteli. It’s beautiful dark, oily wrapper, very rustic looking, and appealing to my pers

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onal aesthetic. I certainly didn’t mind shelling out over $10 each for a couple of these. I remember smoking a Trinidad Fundadores one New Years Eve about 20 years ago and it was spectacular, but absolutely nothing like this Trinidad. This was a heavy, lush cigar. It was my kind of cigar, loaded with dark chocolate and espresso flavors,

with some spiciness. This flew to the top of the list of my fa

vorite Altadis cigars. This cigar was exploding with flavor and I loved it.

 

That’s a

ll for today, until the next time, 

 

CigarCraig

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February 14, 2021 · 10:59 am

Romeo y Julieta 1875 Nicaragua and a Partagas Serie D No. 6

Let’s talk a about a couple of completely different cigars! Yesterday I was out and about and I decided to stop in my local shop on the way by and see if they had anything new. There are shops in the same chain a few miles east and west that I would probably have had a better chance of finding newer stuff, but I had been running errands for a while and was tired of driving around. The only thing that struck me as new (judging by the self talker that said “new arrival”, which may or may not have actually been “new”), was the Romeo y Julieta 1875 Nicaragua. I picked up a few toros, what the hell. Historically, there have not been a lot of Romeos that have tripped my trigger in the 25 or so years I’ve been smoking cigars, at least not the ones made outside Cuba. I have to confess an affection for the RyJ Coronitas en Cedros as I bought a box to share at my daughter’s wedding that was spectacular, so that’s a sentimental favorite. It’s Valentine’s Day weekend, what’s more romantic than a cigar named after a couple who committed suicide together in the name of love? Anyway, the cigar is a 6” x 52 Nicaraguan puro made by Plasencia for Altadis, who is owned by someone now.

 

Quick aside: with all the discussion of General Cigar splitting off a bunch of their brands into the new Forged Cigar Company, has anyone considered that they could be positioning their portfolio of legacy Cuban brands for sale? It seems funny to me that they have placed all of the old Cuban brands under this umbrella, leaving the brands that have the brand ambassadors, like Macanudo, CAO and Cohiba (not a legacy Cuban brand, but a post-embargo brand), with General Cigar. It seems like a nice package deal to sell to, I don’t know, maybe whoever just bought the Altadis brands like RyJ, Upmann and Montecristo (along with the portion of Habanos). It would tie things up pretty nicely  from a trademark standpoint. Just a thought, probably doesn’t make sense, but what makes sense? Wait, Punch isn’t included in Forged, that throws a monkey wrench into my theory, and why does “Forged” have to be so similar to “Foundry”? Couldn’t they come up with something more original? There’s something funny about the Punch trademark that I can’t recall. It’s all very confusing.

 

Back to the 1875 Nicaragua, it’s a nice cigar. Oddly, still not my cuppa tea for some reason, but a perfectly good cigar. The construction was perfect, and it smoked for a good two hours plus. Why is it that the cigars you love don’t seem to smoke long enough and the one that you tolerate last forever? It was woody, with some subtle spices, but more on the leathery/earthy side than I prefer, which seems to be the trend with the RyJs to me. I think the Reserva Real Nicaragua was one I liked, which seems consistent because I recall liking the original Reserva Real. Different strokes, right?

 

Back in May of 2018 my wife and I took a trip to Rome, Italy to see the sights. Of course, I took some cigars with me, but I picked some up while I was there. Toscanos were very inexpensive there, and I bought some that I hadn’t seen here. I’m pretty sure I had Toscano Garibaldi’s before they were available in the US. I think a 5-pack of Toscanos was €7 or something. I probably still have some I haven’t opened. That was also at the time that you could still legally buy Cuban cigars abroad. I don’t desire a lot of Cubans, but I do like one now and then, so I picked up a five pack of Montecristo No.5 and a five pack of Partagas Serie D. No.6, both  small cigars. I hadn’t smoked any of them until last night when I was looking for a short smoke and came across the pack of D No. 6 and opened it up. This is 3½” x 50, a nice little smoke for under an hour. Of course, it’s a Cuban puro, and one never knows if you’re going to get the one that’s plugged or not. Cuban Roulette? This one wasn’t, and it was a good smoke, typical Cuban twang, and what I like in a Cuban Partagas, which is my favorite Cuban brand anyway. This was a pretty cool little smoke, I’m sorry I didn’t get more than one of the five packs.

 

That’s all for today, until the next time,

 

CigarCraig

 

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December 22, 2019 · 10:10 am

Visits to Cigar Mojo and Wooden Indian and Cigar Aficionado’s Top Ten Thoughts

There’s some crossover in the subject line, so I’ll get to that, but first off I had occasion to visit two shops in my area  that have recently undergone renovations, and in the case of Cigar Mojo, in King Of Prussia, PA, moved into a new building. Thursday Cigar Mojo had a Drew Estate event, which had the dual purpose of saying farewell to our area’s long time rep Alex, who’s moving up the ladder, and hello to Ali, who we’ve known for years from working in stores in the area and most recently being a rep for EPC. Cigar Mojo is now a free standing building, nestled in between Aldi and Duluth Trading Company stores, with a large and well stocked humidor, public and members lounges, an outdoor patio with a TV (and heaters), kitchen, the works. I think it’s about two and a half times the size of their old location. I smoked a Herrera Esteli Brazilian Maduro Toro while I was there and it was delicious, probably my second favorite Herrera Esteli behind the Norteño, which I smoked later (a Corona Extra). The first time I visited Mojo’s new location was the first day they were there and it was a big mess! It was not now, they have everything sorted out and it was really nice! They even have their name on the big sign on Rt 202. As a bonus, I made a cameo appearance on the Roxxy the Rebel Youtube show. 

 

Friday I happened to see that the Wooden Indian, who had been having a sort of 12 days of events kind of thing going on, was having and Altadis event with Tom Stroud, our area rep. I’ve know Tom a long time, and haven’t seen him in a while. Additionally, I have been extremely negligent in visiting the Wooden Indian since they’ve remodeled. I missed their bid Drew Estate event in September because we went to Miami, and I just haven’t gotten by there. Dave, who owns the shop, acquired the rest of the front part of the space where the store is and did a complete overhaul of the store. Where the Liga Privada Lounge once was is now a spacious humidor. Where the rather cramped humidor was, and bumped out

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into the new space, is the new and improved Liga Privada lounge. The lounge now has windows, making it nice and bright, with a kitchenette and plenty of space. They also put new flooring in the retail area, brightening it up. I can’t imagine what the carpet there must have been like when they took it up! Anyway, the Shop looks beautiful, the humidor is well stocked and has a great selection, and is still one of my favorite shops in the area. While they didn’t have the Aging Room Quattro Nicaragua Maestro, they did have the Espresivo, the Robusto sibling of the Cigar Aficionado No.1 Cigar of the Year. I figured I’d better give it a smoke while it was in front of me to see what the fuss was about. I bought two and they had about 8 left and they weren’t exactly being scooped up, so maybe the WI customers don’t care about the CA ratings, or they were holding out for the Maestro, which is a torpedo, but good luck seeing on of those any time soon. I’ll be honest, I thought it was a really good cigar, and I enjoyed the crap out of it. It was well balanced with some coffee and cocoa and nuttiness. It’s another great cigar from the AJ Fernandez factory. It had a nice, slow burn too for a 5″ x 50, which was nice. 

 

I have to admit, in the CA top ten, I’ve only smoked two of the cigars, and it’s been ten of more years since I’ve smoked either of those two (which should give a big clue which two they are!) If you take vitola out of the equation, that doubles the number as of Friday. I think I smoke I reasonable variety of cigars! I bet if I smoke 400 cigars a year at least 350 of them are different, and that probably a pretty good variety, you’d agree. I could go through my Instagram feed and figure this out, but who has the patience? I could have picked up the Upmann, but I’m not spending $18 on a cigar right now, and I’m not entirely sure why I’ve never smoked a Padron 1926, might be the same reason I didn’t pick up an Upmann, or is it that I can’t imagine that it can be that much better than a 1964, which is darned near perfect? The Tatuaje piques my interest, I haven’t seen the Illusione, the Warped or the RP, I guess. I

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watched the reveals this year and thought to myself, sheesh, have I gotten that far out of touch? I have to get down into the top 25 to see some more familiar faces. I love the Punch Diablo, but I’m surprised it did so well, I figured it would be to pedestrian for CA (maybe because I liked it?) I’m still itching to try the Enclave Broadleaf, I have to grab on of those one day. I think the Herrera Miami should have been higher, but what do I know? Here’s the thing, the CA list reaches a far different audience than website/blog lists. There’s a whole bunch of different communities in the cigar world, some are on the internet, some aren’t so who’s to argue who’s list is right and who’s isn’t? 

 

In other news, I bought a plane ticket to Vegas for next Month’s Tobacco Plus Expo, and am awaiting approval for my media registration. It seems like a lit of the cigar industry is going to be attending that, so it should be interesting. That’s all for today, until the next time, 

 

CigarCraig

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