Tabacalera Santiago

After Leon we headed for Esteli, with one thing in mind; visit a cigar factory. Everyone associates cigars with Cuba, but the next biggest producer of them is Esteli, with factories there also producing the Cuban Cachiba cigars.

We stayed at Hostel Sonati, where Dave, an English guy working on the desk, gave us a recommendation for Tabacalera Santiago, which he had visited a few days earlier. He had told us it was really good and also FREE! Many of the tours offered by tour operators in Esteli charged $5 or $10 and Ernesto would later tell us that the only difference is that you have a different guide who takes you round.

First we had to get there... and none of the taxi drivers knew where it was. So, we rushed back to the hostel to call them up, and they told us it was near Club Santa Maria. We finally managed to find a taxi driver who luckily lived round the corner from it, and who also didn't try and gringo tax us!

When we got to the tabacalera, Ernesto, the tour guide employed by the factory was waiting to show us round. He took us through the process from start to finish.

First, fresh cuban tobacco leaves are left to dry out for a number of days, in an absolutely stinking room! The room is insulated as the leaves need to be kept at a certain humidity in order to dry correctly. Their temperature is regularly monitored and the leaves are moved around as necessary, to ensure that they're all being evenly dried out. I don't know how the men who work here spend so much time in this room - there is an overpowering smell of ammonia that stings the nose, throat and eyes.

When the leaves are fully dried, they are sorted to identify which ones will be used for filler, wrapping or cheaper cigars. Every leaf is used somewhere. For this process a number of women sort through the leaves, categorising them by quality and colour and removing stalks from those that will be used for wrapping.

After seeing this we moved on to the main factory floor, where men and women were rolling the cigars. I had always thought that cigars contained some sort of additives, but real cigars are pure tobacco leaf. Women and men work in pairs to produce cigars. The men have the job of rolling the filler into cigar shapes, using a manual rolling machine, which was basically a bigger version of the cigarette roller my grandad used to use. The men are tasked with this as it requires muscles to exert the pressure required to use the rolling machine.

Once they have rolled a cigar, it goes into a mould with a bunch of other cigars. Another mould is placed on top and then the whole block is put in a vice and more pressure applied for a few hours, to ensure that the cigar holds its shape.

After this the cigars are taken out of the mould and passed on to the female part of the duo. The women then have the job of wrapping the cigars in the finer leaves. They spread and smooth the leaf out and then cut the top and bottom part of the leaf to obtain the required shape. They then take the pressed cigar and roll it so that the leaf wraps tightly round it. They seal the bullet shaped end either with some sugar glue (so, all natural), or may cut another small bit of wrapper leaf and stick it over the end. They then cut the other end off to leave a perfectly shaped, wrapped cigar, which is basically ready to smoke.

Ciaran had a go at rolling and I had a go at wrapping. Wrapping was very tricky and you could see why women do this part of the production - it requires a delicate touch. We would have liked to have kept our cigars but the workers are paid per cigar they make and only earn about $6 a day, so it didn't really seem fair to keep them.

After we had tried our hand at it, Ernesto offered us a cigar each. I'm not a smoker so I just had a couple of puffs. Tasted OK, but I let Ciaran smoke the rest!

When the cigars are fully rolled they then go through numerous quality control checks. One lady groups them into bundles of 10 by their colour, which gives a cleaner look to each pack.

Once bundled they are passed on to another table where they are stickered and then another where they're put into individual cellophane wrappers.

They are then boxed and sent off for a final quality check, where a lady makes sure that they are all properly labeled, wrapped and facing the same way, before sealing the box. Tedious work!

And then the cigars are sent off to places all around the world. Numerous international brands are made here, as well as those that are sold under the Esteli name. The tour was so good - I never thought that cigars would be totally hand made and I'm amazed at how much work goes into it and how little the workers are paid, despite actually being considered to be 'well-paid'. The ones who do then making and wrapping are paid more than those doing labelling and quality checks , who are actually paid less than $6 a day.

I'm so glad we went to the factory direct, instead of booking through an agency. Ernesto was a brilliant guide, so welcoming and informative, and I can't imagine that paying for a different guide would have been any better. And of course we bought cigars at the end anyway!