Aback, Much Woe, Cigars in The Snow

FOR the first time this Winter, it snowed this morning.

Not the wonderful thick, dry, blanket of snow that one remembers from childhood, which threw a shroud over the land in a couple of hours and transformed a boring daily routine into a scene from a magical movie.

No, this was the wet, sloppy, soon-to-be-grey-mush sort of snow that dribbled across much of the UK for a few hours before normal service was resumed and the rain spattered down in an exhausted, lugubrious manner as it has seemingly done since Noah was last patching up the Ark.

But nevertheless, the surprise of the opening of the curtains routine still rang true and it made our collective minds turn to cigars in the snow. Of course, if you’re Austrian, a cigar lover and a skier (and it’s hard to meet an Austrian who isn’t a skier, to be honest) you will be well versed in stabbing your skis in the snow at the bottom of the piste and finding a secure snug to light up something good.

But for the majority of us Brits, snow is more of a rarity these days. Do you have any good snowy cigar stories? Sautter pal Nick Hammond tells a nice one in his latest book, Around The World In 80 Cigars, recounting a tale of a wintry day’s shooting and a blizzard that put pay to the day’s sporting proceedings but didn’t stop a memorable smoke while watching the sky fall in.

While the thought of smoking a cigar in a hot tub on a wintry night is quite excellent, the reality might not live up to your fantasies. You’re in grave danger of accidentally dropping your stogie into the steaming depths, or at the very least, ruining the wrapper with soggy hands. And the hugely disparate temperatures swirling around you, from the heat of the tub to the frigidity of the surrounding air, is almost certain to crack your wrapper. Sorry to burst your bubble and all that.

But after all that naysaying, there must be numerous occasions when snow has added peace, stunning scenery and a sprinkle of magic dust to thousands of cigar experiences over the years. It might be via one enjoyed on a terrace looking down across the mountains as snow clouds sweep through, the twinkling lights of nearby villages speckling the darkness like fireflies.

Or it might be in your own back garden under the stars, marvelling at the momentousness of the universe.

Perhaps it’s careering down a slope with a cigar clamped between your teeth or enjoying a cable car ride with something mellow?

Whatever your snow experiences, we’d be glad to hear of them, not least because it’s good for our experts to peruse new ideas for every situation. When customers wander in and say ‘I’m off to Gstaad and I want to take some decent smokes,’ we like to be able to reply ‘Certainly Sir/Madam, we have some ideas on what might work very well in Gstaad.’ That’s the way we roll.

In your opinion, are there cigars that work really well in cold and snowy conditions and which form a regular staple in your humidor at these times?

Do enlighten us.