Estelí isn’t going to blow your box apart. It’s not an awful place to be, it’s just not the most inspiring place either. If you’re one of these people that gets a kick out of being one of so few tourists in town you think you’re the only tourist in town you’re going to love it, and there are some decent places to get grilled chicken too which is our current favourite thing to shovel into our faceholes. Half a perfectly and deliciously cooked chook for C$140? Oh go on then.
It’s the cigar capital of Nicaragua, apparently a lot of Cubans fled here and brought all their lovely cigar knowledge with them and it turns out the climate around here is pretty good for sprouting a tobacco plant or several. We passed a huge plantation on the way back from Miraflor. There were fuck off great big sheds, several of them, and you could see what must have been thousands of leaves hanging up to dry. Obviously the done thing is to do a tour of a cigar factory so we just booked with Treehuggers and were led literally around the corner to a small factory.
Okay so the tour was in Spanish but he was careful to speak slowly and clearly for us so we gleaned a fair bit of knowledge. Obviously if you actually speak Spanish rather than muddling through with a lot of guess work, shrugging and general confusion then you’ll get a lot more out of it but even if your understanding is rudimentary at best it’s worth a look. It’s still fun to just see it all happening. There are three types of factory; the big industrial ones, the small commercial endeavours, and the small family business. This was of the middle type. Not massive, not tiny.
He did warn us that the smell would be, well, intense. My Spanish stretches that far. But fuck me, what’s the Spanish for “complete and utter assault on your nasal passages”? It’s a bit of a creeper, at first you’re like, yeah this is an unusual musk but okay. By the time you’ve stood there staring intently at a man you don’t share a language with, trying to grab the odd word and fill in the context, I swear you can FEEL the smell in the depths of your nose. It just moves in rent free. I can’t describe it, it’s a stench all on its own, like goblins are tapping on the hole in your skull where your nose goes with tiny hammers.
The first thing we were shown was the capote, the most expensive part of the cigar, it’s the wrapper that covers the finished product to make it look all smooth and posh and something you’d actually want to put in your mouth. He explained that it takes three months to grow the plant and three months of it hanging up before it’s ready but then the longer you leave it after that the better it is. Like rum. These are perfect leaves and they’re a bit, like, damp I guess? He was saying something about humidity but I didn’t catch it, I think it was something like when the leaves are dry they’re brittle but with a bit of humidity they become very pliable and he scrunched one up by way of demonstration. But yeah, one of these leaves will make two wrappers and it’s someone’s job to just take the big vein out of the middle of the leaf. I’m a fan of a repetitive task but even I’d probably have to cry in a corner during my lunch hour if I had to do it all day every day.
Our guide went to a big box of seconds, cigars that didn’t pass quality control because they were ever so slightly lumpy or they were bunched incorrectly so they didn’t draw properly. He gave one to each of us, clipped the ends and lit them saving the big bastard for himself. I don’t smoke but I know you don’t inhale cigar smoke, you just roll it around your mouth, but I have fuck all idea what that even means. I sucked it in and did what I thought was rolling but I just looked like I was rinsing with mouthwash. I spat the smoke out. No. Fuck no. This is not for me. I do not look sophisticated, I look like I’m trying to break the world record for fitting the most Fruit Pastilles into my gob except they taste like a fucking bonfire and I can’t get them out fast enough. Tarrant was having a lovely time though, she’s partial to the odd cigar back home with a whiskey. Apparently my girlfriend is a 64 year old man in a tweed jacket and a cravat.
We were told we could smoke throughout, it’s weird enough seeing people chuffing away indoors, nevermind in the actual workplace. We were led through to the production room where men and women sat in pairs. I know he told us that it’s always a man and a woman but I didn’t catch why. The man is the bunchero, he literally bunches the filler leaves together and uses a binder to keep them together. The tobacco leaves here come from three different regions in northern Nicaragua; Estelí, Somoto and Jalapa. They don’t have to be perfect to be fillers, they’re just going to be bunched together by someone in possession of a Y chromosome and wrapped up. The leaves from Jalapa smelled the strongest but they mix them together, all three, for that perfectly flavoured cancer stick.
Then they’re put in a vice and turned occasionally before they’re handed off to the woman, the rolero so she can wrap them and make them look pretty. We watched one woman, she was lightning fast. She cut the leaf to a crescent shape, wrapped the cigar, cut the excess away then used a tool to cut specific shapes out of the excess. She used this to cover one end, then she used a tool to cut a perfect circle and this was the cap. Some manner of glue is used throughout to keep that bad boy together. She clipped the uncapped end and there you go. Smokable stick. It took her less than a minute to wrap one cigar.
With the miracle of Google Translate I asked our guide if they got paid hourly or monthly or what and he said in this particular factory they’re paid per cigar so this lady must have been raking it in. He said they’d make a minimum of 250 to 300 cigars each a day but the faster teams can make more. I’m not going to lie, it looks immensely satisfying, I wouldn’t mind giving it a go. I’d probably be better at the bunching thing but I lack the requisite penis so apparently rules that profession out for me.
We were shown the packing room next, they were all women. They were sat in a lovely air conditioned room. One woman was sorting the cigars into stacks, perhaps she was quality control? No idea, my Spanish was useless here. Three other women were putting the cigars into cellophane packets. The room next door was a storage room, apparently the cigars are kept here for a while until they’re ready to be packed and these were the cigars you could buy if you wanted. Tarrant wanted. It’s her birthday in July and she wanted some smoke in her facehole in honour of that, plus she wanted some to take home to share with a mate. She chose a few and they were wrapped up for her in the packing room. Now all she has to do it’s carry them around for three more months without crushing them.
So that was a great way to kill an hour. I probably only understood about 5% of what we were told but that’s fine, I think we got the basics. Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got the taste of burning leaves to try and get out of my mouth.
Jump to “Useful shit to know…”
Estelí, Estelí Department, Nicaragua
Stayed at: Hostal Ulua & Hostal Luna International, Estelí
Useful shit to know…
- It’s a breeze getting from Matagalpa to Estelí by bus.
- You go from Cotran Sur, they’re more or less hourly.
- It cost C$45 each and took nearly two hours.
- We booked our cigar tour at Treehuggers.
- It cost US$15 and lasted just over an hour.
- Tours are in Spanish but it’s just fun seeing where it all happens.
- You have the opportunity to buy cigars at the end for rock bottom prices. US$3 for the simple, normal ones and going up from there. They’ll even wrap them for you.
Travel & Shit 