Best Boxes from Cuba

[moidoid]

I have a friend who is lucky enough to be going to Cuba for his honeymoon soon and he has asked for advice on good, reasonably priced cigars to buy by the box.

I understand that he and his new missus may be able to bring 100 cigars out of the country and with a bit of luck he may express his gratitude to his best man (moi) in the only way i will accept.
The first two boxes are likely to be:

Partagas D4
Partagas P2

but I am undecided about what else to recommend. I was thinking that the Maduro genios in a box of 10 would be as cheap here as anywhere and a box of BBF would fill the good but cheap criteria.

Any other ideas?

[cj121]

You could potentially get loads of recommendations on this, but I think you've nailed it, without complicatings things

[moidoid]

You could potentially get loads of recommendations on this, but I think you've nailed it, without complicatings things

Well, I am VERY perceptive, but there's always the chance I might have missed something.

[Robusto]

I would love this thread to run because I cannot make up my mind about what to bring back from Cuba in Autumn.

If I don't blow all the float, I can bring back 200 cigars. I don't know whether to get phallic frighteners, Robustos, untried cigars...

If I just bring back my 'regulars', I will be bored.

I've already told my wife to get ready for massive smokes from me non-stop when we are there. Brussels was a sort of in-service training on that lol...

I hate being in the sun so will be slobbing in catinas against the walls smoking off bastards.

[Paulie]

Whatever he gets, make sure he does not get the box from the chap on the street who works at the factory and is trying to make more money by selling his 'one free box a month' he gets as an employee.

[moidoid]

Is the 50 cigars per person right then Robusto? Even if it's more then I'm not sure he/we could/should go over 4 boxes - ?400ish and no space left to put 'em!

I don't think it is worth setting out to get your regular cigars, but if you have any spare capacity at the end of the trip then you could get some in to lay down for a while. If I were in your position, and I sincerely wish I was, I would do a list of desirables, unknown quantities and special/expensive editions and just try to smoke my way through the list. I expect there may be a few cigars out there that you would not necessarily see with ease over here. Then buy what's good.

I would imagine that you could incorporate some sort of scoring and price weighting system that would be fascinating to us and yet could seriously damage your relationship. So perhaps best not to - but you can see the POTENTIAL for the choosing to be as much fun as the decision.

[ACMCC]

I think the same cigars are available in Europe, bar a few RE's maybe, so it is a bit of a costing exercise, go for the most expensive you like!

I remember a thread a while back that had the price's in Cuba listed, this needs cross referencing price wise with a cheap European site so that you could identify where the most money could be saved, I would imagine Cohiba siglo V1 would be a good bet, I'm thinking of going my self, I'd probably get 10 boxes (100) of the juiciest looking LE's RE's etc but it's still worth cross checking.....

[moidoid]

This is the link I use & ?100 is about 154 CUC atm.

http://marty.514crew.com/cigarprices.html

What I meant about the LE's was that you might get a better chance to see them together in one store and smoke singles than you would anywhere else.

[ACMCC]

I agree that it would be nice to see and try a few, I fancy the caribe JL's...

[PoohBore]

My parents were their in late April and had trouble getting singles to try of the wish list they took with them. If you google cuba bank you can find the official exchange rate for businesses which is indicative of the current exchange rate. Marty's site is very good for the prices.

[GoodFella]

just make sure that he gets the cigas at a LCDH

[moidoid]

I will give him very strict instructions.

I will also tell his future missus, (who tbh is lowering herself in getting married to him), because she has sense.