Hot Springs Chronicles

November 26, 2007

Join Cigar Weekly Contributing Editor Tom Chapman (tchapchap) on a whirlwind tour of five eastern U.S.A. cities that "turns boring stuff into a cigar adventure”!

The title of this article is something of a misnomer. In fact, my wife and I turned a family wedding event in Hot Springs, Arkansas into a two-week road trip. We hit Hot Springs via Chicago, continued to St. Louis, and then carried on to Memphis before heading back to our southeast Michigan home via Nashville. I'd also like to point out that we made this trip in March of 2007. Yeah, yeah... I'm right on top of this, I know! Another thing… Without TommyBB's prompting, this piece, good or bad, would never have happened! So, thanks Tommy!

OK. So what the hell does our road trip have to do with cigars? You see, if I'm anywhere with enough time on my hands, I'm looking for a tobacconist! I really enjoy visiting and perusing cigar shops. No surprise there! Fortunately for me, my bride is also a lover of the leaf, and only too glad to join in the search!

Let's start with our first stop – Chicago. We stayed in the northern ‘Loop' at the Palmer House Hilton, which, besides being a short walk from both Millennium and Grant Parks, turned out to be a half block from the oldest (1857!) family owned cigar and pipe shop in the country, Iwan Ries.

This was strictly a coincidence – honest! Iwan Ries, with its extensive cigar selection and enormous variety of pipes, is a must see.

No cigar enthusiast's visit to Chi-town is complete without a visit to a href="http://www.updowncigar.com">Up Down Tobacco.

Owned by cigar retail superstar Diana Silvius, this is an awesome shop with a truly impressive range of top grade smokes.

Oh yeah, we did some other stuff in Chicago too!

Next up was St. Louis. The two of us stayed downtown, within short walking distance to the Gateway Arch and Busch Stadium. This was a relatively brief visit, so we didn't have time to track down any tobacco shops. Still, we did find a number of cigar-friendly places in the area. The most interesting, by far, was the Broadway Oyster Bar. Upon first look, we swore this joint was condemned! Another was BB's Jazz & Blues. Even the lobby bar at the Crowne Plaza Hotel turned out to be cigar friendly! We did manage to take in the Anheuser-Busch Brewery tour. Isn't it illegal to visit St. Louis and not visit the brewery?!

On to Hot Springs, which is the Focal Point of the "Chronicles”. A little bit on this town: It's billed as America's First Resort, or something to that affect, dating back many, MANY years. The central attraction is Hot Springs National Park. And the thermal hot baths, which use naturally occurring hot springs as their source, are the big draw. This very beautiful area is bustling with tourists. We stayed at the Arlington Hotel, a huge old place located right in the middle of the action. The hotel had an enormous wrap-around covered porch, which served as cigar headquarters every evening!

Prior to our trip, I posted a "going to” topic in the Cigar Weekly Smokin' Post forum and received some useful feedback, including advice from our late brother, Doug Odom (God bless you friend). Doug had suggested two shops and a stop at cigar friendly Oaklawn Racetrack (horses). We hit them all!

Churchill's is located in the downtown area on the lowest level of a small, compact, multi-story shopping facility. Doug was absolutely correct when he said these guys have "lax operating hours”! Not once was the store open when I was able to visit! Anyway, I did several nose presses on their window, and the inside does look like a great place for a cigar store!

Cigar World was yet another shop recommended by Doug. This was a great place, with a moderately sized and very well stocked walk-in humidor as well as a lounge area with a couple of comfortable chairs.

A recommended stop!

Memphis was next on the itinerary. Again, we stayed right downtown (are you spotting a pattern here?!). Memphis is an awesome town with lots to do, especially if you're a blues lovers like both of us. When we weren't sleeping, we were listening to Blues on Beale Street, smoking cigars and eating ribs! Damn, I think I put a 50-point spike in my LDL over the course of a couple of days!

We found a very interesting cigar shop downtown, the Memphis Tobacco Bowl.

Memphis Tobacco Bowl, a combination news stand/coffee counter/pipe and cigar store, opened in 1949. Walking into this shop was like hitting a time warp. The lighting was dim, the ceiling high and the wood work dark and worn. I loved this place!

They have a small but surprisingly well stocked (including Opus X!) walk-in humidor and a large variety of pipes and tobaccos. A very comfortable lounge area is also available. This shop is a must-see!

Our final destination on a "hammer down” run from Memphis back home to Michigan was Nashville. There, we found CAO Cigars. This is a go-out-of-your-way-if-you-have-to, absolute must-stop for any cigar enthusiast. You'll never know how serious CAO is about cigars until you visit its headquarters. The outside, as clean and tidy as it is, has a decided warehouse look to it.

Well, most of the building is used for holding and shipping product. But the main entrance leads visitors down a long hallway that chronicles the history of CAO, from Cano's first Meerschaum pipes through the latest cigar offerings, and everything in between.

The CAO people take extreme pride in what they do, and have not lost sight of where they came from. At the end of the hall, we were met by the most personable receptionist I've come across in any business! She took us on a tour, which included an extensive "customer” walk-in humidor as well as another amazing walk-in housing tens of thousands of prototype and various control samples for blends currently in production. This last room was absolutely breathtaking – kind of like what "cigar heaven” might be

That pretty well wraps it up. It was a great trip, and we obviously did a lot of other things that didn't involve the leaf. But who cares!

Thanks for taking the time to read about our adventures!

Tom Chapman (tchapchap) is a recently retired mechanical engineer who survived over three decades in the bowels of the domestic car business developing future products. He's been a lover of the leaf for several years, and has been known to go considerably out of his way to make cigar-related visits. In addition to family and cigars, Tom enjoys motorcycles (owning more of them than he needs to!) and, in spite of living breathing, eating and getting beaten up over cars, still loves them too! He's also an avid fisherman.