The gleaming facade of the A.J. Fernandez factory. But I guess you figured that out already.
Ricky (Enrique) the Production Manager, guiding us through the sorting floor.
Rebuilding a pilone during the fermenting process. Each pilone has to be turned from bottom to top and inside to out each time the interior temperature reaches between 120 and 135 degrees, depending on the type of tobacco. Lots and lots of work and all of it done, very carefully, by hand.
The Man himself. A.J. Fernandez with The Ray-Man.
Nirvana: The Fernandez aging room. From here, the cigars go for final packaging.
And now, back to the cigar tour!
Today was all about A.J. Fernandez, the rock star whiz kid of the Nicaraguan cigar world. Lovingly referred to as the "Rain Man of Cigars," AJ grew up in San Luis, Cuba, one of the most esteemed cigar regions in Cuba, mentored by Alejandro Robaina, one of Cuba's most famous tobacco growers. His grandfather founded San Lotano cigars in Cuba He ended up in Esteli, turning out cigars with a pair of rollers and a tiny garage for a factory.
When he was 26 years old and rolling cigars for other makers, he met his now business partner. Together they went on to build one of the most important cigar factories in the world. It is an amazing place, a vertical company from farms to final product, with AJ flitting around the country checking on every detail. Everyone we talked to said that AJ is happiest driving a tractor around on one of the farms, which are scattered across four regions of Nicaragua.
We arrived at the factory and were treated to a splendid welcome. The factory is a gleaming structure, and the guesthouse compound is truly amazing, the uber man-cave by which everything else has to be measured. This would be where we would be treated like royalty for dinner, but first the factory and farms.
The steps are the same as other factories: tobacco fermenting, drying, aging, sorting, blending and rolling. Our first big surprise was meeting The Man on the factory floor. He greeted all of us and we tried not to be too star-struck. I also met his uncle, Rafael. I asked Rafael if he was managing the rolling floor. He said "No, I manage AJ." It seems as if AJ runs around like a little kid, constantly enthralled with the entire process and always thinking up new things to try. Other folks run around after AJ and try to keep him attached to the planet.
After making our rounds through the factory, we headed out into the fields. Everything starts here, growing a finicky plant that requires almost constant care to become anything even remotely useful to the purpose of making a cigar. There were seedling greenhouses, the fields themselves, and the wonderful drying barns.
Walking into a tobacco drying barn is like walking into olfactory bliss tempered with filtered light. The dim barns are filled with pairs of tobacco leaves hanging down from horizontal poles. The entire barn is a framework for supporting these poles and the result is an overhead forest of leaves dangling straight down, from four feet above the earthen floor all the way to the ceiling almost thirty feet above. The verdant aroma is something to be experienced. Reaching up to touch one of the leaves is like running velvet through your fingers. The bright sunlight outside the barn doors is muted with coarse fabric. The resulting dim light turns the inside of the barn into a fairyland of muted greens and yellows that disappear into the upside down forest just above ones head, It is magical. The tobacco leaves are carefully monitored and rotated in the barn, top to bottom, inside to out, as the drying process continues. When the leaves are ready, they head to the factory for processing.
We headed to another farm, almost crippling the Bozo-bus with a rock lodged between the dual rear tires. Luckily for us, no rock is a match for Samir and a steel bar. After the brief unscheduled stop we continued on our way back towards town and lunch.
Another huge meal later, we traipsed back to the bus, only to be treated by Colin's glum face announcing that the Padron Factory tour had fallen through. Padron is special to all of us and Colin knew that we really wanted to go, but the Padrons will not schedule in advance. Despite having set up the time and made all of the arrangements, some issue had caused our Padron person to have to be out at the fields and so no tour. We now had several hours of free time before heading back to the AJ Fernandez mansion for our dinner. While this was hard for some of us, I used the opportunity for a much-needed walk-about and did not begrudge the schedule change.
In the weirdness of blog time-travel, I have already posted about the walk-about. Thus ended our fantastic day of cigar touring. I had no idea of what an evening the dinner was going to turn out to be.
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