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Guest Review: La Gloria Cubana Wavell

By Jesse | August 28, 2008 |

Tony submitted this review as part of the Show Us Your Camacho Contest. You still have a few days left to enter.

Company: General Cigar
Line: La Gloria Cubana
Vitola: Wavell 5 x 50
Wrapper: Ecuadorian Sumatra
Filler: Nicaraguan and Dominican
Flavor: Medium – Full
Strength: Medium
Price: $73.00 (Box of 25)

Time: 2:05pm
Temperature: 80 degrees
Humidity: 56%
Smoking Time: 60 minutes
Beverage: Watery cola from the sandwich shop

La Gloria Cubana is my friend’s favorite brand. When CI had the 5-pack deal on the Wavell I had to jump. I know he likes stronger cigars so I made sure to eat first. Here’s how it all went down.

Things went a little wacky from the start. My torch lighter decided to stop sparking ¾ of the way into lighting. Luckily I had my barbecue lighter nearby and I used that to finish the job.

Construction: This was a very nicely put together cigar. It felt very firm across the stick with no soft spots. The wrapper was slightly mottled and the color of coffee with a little creamer in it. It had a couple of medium veins, but appeared very smooth. The only noticeable problems were the overlapping portions of the wrapper were not perfectly smooth and there was a small hole just behind the band. The hole never became a big problem.

The draw was very free. I got a sweet prune flavor (which I almost always do) and some coffee on the cold taste.

Burn: I had burn issues from the start. Who knows how much of that was my lighting fiasco and how much was the windy conditions or the fact that it was raining or that my humidor runs between 67% – 71%. In other words, I’ll give General Cigar a pass on the spotty burn. Heck, I don’t really care about the burn anyway. Because of my lighter situation I did make extensive use of the “spit-trick” instead of touching up.

Flavors:

1^st third: I got a strong burnt wood flavor from my weird lighting method. At about the one inch mark everything smoothed out and I was getting some pepper in the background.

2^nd Third: I started to get a “Dominican” flavor in the finish. The finish was also very clean and the flavors didn’t linger on my palette. When I ran the smoke through my sinuses I got a slightest warm-spice. Not quite cinnamon, but warm.

Last Third: The final third began earlier than I would expect. Just before reaching the band the flavor seemed to pick up a lot. The flavor was a much richer Dominican tobacco flavor. The finish became longer and stayed on my palette. The aroma of the resting smoke also seemed to increase. The smoke took on a distinct woody flavor and I felt a slight irritation in the back of my throat.

Other:

At 60 minutes I decided to put the stick down. I felt the nicotine coming on and it seemed to be going out on its own anyway. From light to final ash this stick produced clouds of thick smoke. The ash was very solid and considering the windy conditions it had very little flaking.

Verdict: This is a very good cigar. The woody and Dominican flavors are not my favorite, but there must be a lot of people who like them. Coming in at one hour this is a short smoke. I can take well over an hour with a robusto. It’s definitely worth the price ($3?!) and makes a good everyday cigar. And if you didn’t have anything else on hand it would hold up fine as an occasion smoke.

Popularity: 42% [?]

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Tags: Cigar Review, Dominican Republic, General Cigar, La Gloria Cubana, Wavell