Some Viaje Cigars, an HVC and an Espinosa Rerun

I try to include new (to me, or actually new) cigars in my Sunday posts, if nothing else but to create a searchable database of sorts for myself. This is a blog, with is short for “Web Log”, and I write it for my own benefit and it’s a happy accident that other people choose to spend their time reading it. This is something for which I am grateful, by the way! Once in a while I smoke a cigar that I’ve written about in the past that I feel deserves mentioning again. In this case it was the Espinosa Laranja Azulejo. This week I smoked both the Robusto Extra (5½” x 52) and the Gordo (6″ x 60) and enjoyed them very much! This has a sungrown Sumatra wrapper, a Brazilian Arapiraca Binder and Nicaraguan fillers and is made at the San Lotano factory in Ocotal, Nicaragua. I smoked this back in 2021, and loved it, a recent mention somewhere put it back on my radar, and I picked up a few when I visited a shop in the area that has some Espinosa cigars. Oddly, not a lot of my local shops have them for some reason. Anyway, I smoked the robusto in the shop on Monday evening, one of the friendliest visits I’ve had to that particular shop in quite some time, and it was an excellent smoke. I picked up the Gordo on the way out because I was so impressed. The gordo is box pressed, so it smoked more like a toro, both shapes have deep, rich espresso and spice flavors, all my favorite flavors. This is a supre good cigar, if you like the cigars I like, you’ll like this one.

On to the “new to me” cigars! On that same visit to a shop on Monday I picked up a Viaje Birthday Blend Collector’s Edition. This shop has a pretty “classic” selection, it was hard for me to find a cigar I hadn’t smoked before. By the way, Viaje’s website sucks, it’s just a landing page with rudimentary contact info. I got information from Cigara, which is owned by Scandinavian Tobacco. This is a 6¼” x 52 classic torpedo, which comes with a birthday wrapping paper sleeve. I admit that I don’t know what year this cigar is from, they seem to change every year, and I am not familiar enough with Viaje to know to look. I’m guessing it’s the latest, based on wrapper color and flavor alone, which is Criollo, not one of my favorite tobaccos. Anyway, I found this to be an interesting cigar, with some mild spice and a somewhat floral quality. It performed very well and while I wouldn’t seek this out again (unless I find myself in the same shop in the near future and can go look at the box!), but I wouldn’t pass one up if offered.

Smoking the Viaje prompted me to visit Cigar Mojo close to home here knowing that they had some Viaje cigars in stock. I selected a Satori Nirvana, which is the 6″ x 50 toro in the line. When I see “Satori” I’m reminded of a song off one of my favorite albums, King Crimson’s Beat from 1982, “Sartori in Tangier”. I know, Satori is different from SaNtori, but my mind goes there. This has a rather ugly, mottled wrapper, bu that usually means it’s going to taste great. It’s listed as San Andrés wrapper with Nicaraguan binder and filler, made at the Raices Cubanas factory in Honduras. There were some earthy flavors and some chocolaty flavors, and I rather enjoyed the cigar. They had a couple other Viaje cigars at Mojo, but they were on the smaller side, maybe I’ll pick them up for the future.

Finally, I got around to picking up an HVC Hotcakes Golden Age in the Laguito No 5 vitola, 6″x 54. I probably have passed this by in the past because it’s Connecticut wrapped, but I think I’ve worked my way through the HVC line, and had to try this one. I’ve heard good things. This reportedly has some “Corojo 2006 Maduro” in the Nicaraguan filler blend. This cigar combines the bready, sweet grassy Connecticut Shade flavors with some gutsy sweetness from the fillers. I like this, and it was very nice smoking this on the porch watching a movie last night, amongst my favorite activities (or lack thereof).