The Ghosts of Habanos Past

[ValeTudoGuy]

Once the credit card cools down, it's smokin at the mo.
I would def be up for splitting something special.

I think you and I are in the same boat!

[Maxsi]

Once the credit card cools down, it's smokin at the mo.
I would def be up for splitting something special.

[butternutsquashpie]

And a Happy New Year to all the Newbee's who haven't yet smoked anything out of the average or out of infancy, my advice to you is stay exactly as you are, because venturing into vintage will zombify you into endless shop surfing and leave you with tastes in-the-head that can't be satisfied by anything in the current catalogue.

or if you can find it, it'll be the price of a GR or BHK
whereas a punch ninfas, ra 898, or lgc MdO1 would be half that price if one can find a good enough source. it's sad indeed. but heyy, who are we to lobby against David Tang and Habanos? too small a voice and too bleed a heart.. just like the smoking legislations in all our countries, it's an uphill battle against the gods on Olympus

nowadays, just searching for LEs and REs are enough of a chore on their own. i'm just hanging on the hope that they will indeed come out with the RA 898 DE RE for 2015

[Simon-JG-hr]

Well, I was going to ask to add my name to the list... But if the names are going into a little book...

Agree with all on the sorry state of deletions - some truly wonderful cigars have been taken from us. (Some less so, of course, but there do seem to be some very special smokes which have disappeared for whatever reason... Do they need a reason, or pick them out of a hat?)

[Simon Bolivar]

Noted Pete, your name will be added to my little book

[peanutpete]

it is a sad tale indeed Arf and Simon
I would be up for some splits on HTF cigars

[Simon Bolivar]

A sad winter's tale Arf & you know I with you on this subject of deletions. Perhaps buying more boxes for spilt shares is one answer, half a dozen of a deleted line in your humi x a few buys & there would always be something to dip into.

How do other memebers feel about this subject ? Anyone else interested in future split shares? I include Mitch's auctions in this; I have brought before with two others & split the proceeds afterwards. We can't stop deletions but we can try & grab a few for own own pleasure whilst their still around.

[tippexx]

Well, it's that time of year again, time to speculate on what will go in 2014 and to reflect on some of the great Cuban cigars which have left this Earth never to be found or repeated again.

Why Habanos SA do some of the things they do is a mystery, cost probably has something to do with it, or maybe the better tobaccos being diverted to the EL and RE programs. But whatever, year on year we're loosing the likes of the Diplomaticos 5 and get some ghastly mediocrity like the Rafael Gonzalez Perlas in return.

Perhaps I'm just old and yearn for a past which didn't really exist, or worse I might be cack-tastebudded, and the ubiquitous RyJ Romeos 1 to 3 and the endlessly and unmercifully churned out Partagas SD4 are in fact good cigars, and all the lost vitola which I like are little better than Waitrose Wintermann.

Still, not to worry, what we can't find we can't have and can't miss, that is of course unless we've been unfortunate enough to smoke an RyJ Celestiales Finos, Gloria Cubana Medaille d'Or No 1, El Rey de Mundo Grandes de Espana, Punch Ninfas or a Partagas Seleccion Privada No 1, because then we join the ranks of the walking fallen, doomed forever to scour the planet in search of half-remembered tastes burned by guilty pleasure into our memories, and which we are unlikely ever to experience again.

True, all hope isn't totally lost. There's always SmokeyMo's Auctions or the prospect of some future trip to Andorra, but even there Partagas Astorias and Ramon Allones 898 will inevitably loose their shelf space to Wide Churchills and Open Series.

If I have a great regret, it's that I didn't really start smoking cigars until mid 2008, and by then most of the cigars I've mentioned had but disappeared. Had I realised then what I know to be true now, I would have stretched myself to a box of each and been a very happy fellow today. In future, if something which I really like is to be deleted I'll get a box, because not to do so results only in dead vitola cravings.

So, Here's to the New Year and Here's to all deleted vitola haunted BOTL everywhere. May you find what you desire and enjoy the space and time to enjoy it.

And a Happy New Year to all the Newbee's who haven't yet smoked anything out of the average or out of infancy, my advice to you is stay exactly as you are, because venturing into vintage will zombify you into endless shop surfing and leave you with tastes in-the-head that can't be satisfied by anything in the current catalogue.