Meerschaum Man Smoking an Alinok Smooth Canadian

Caravan has chosen a medium-bowled Pete as its venue, somewhat loosely packed (the cut is perfect for this). Puff slowly... very slowly, not to avoid bite, but the flavors and aromas are enhanced. Clean and steady burning without drying or fiddling.

Yeah. After a couple unfortunate run-ins with harsh green Pease balkans, I really like this.

Three of five stars

I have always enjoyed latakia blends accompanied by a hefty helping of orientals. Here the spicy, mildly sweet orientals dominate, with the latakia and virginias providing ground support.

Acridity, the great bugaboo of so many English/Balkan blends, is a relatively minor issue, as Caravan stays smooth all the way down. I've smoked this at all hours of the day, finding it light and pleasant enough for morning, and rich and satisfying enough for evening. Mr. Pease has given us some memorable English blends, and this one ranks near the top, my preference for Charing Cross notwithstanding.

***********

Addendum: My most recent tins of Caravan (last twelve months, or so) seem to lack the heft of the inaugural blend. Having been assured by no less an authority than Mr. Pease himself that the blends are identical, and with the added caveat that Caravan, of all his blends, takes the longest to come around, I set aside some cans for future sampling. So far, a years's wait has not restored its former glory, and it still seems suspiciously similar to Blackpoint, although I would not exactly consider that to be a pejorative. Guess I'll have to try again next year. Poor me!

First bowl I rushed so badly that the final third was un-smokable. It had been a long day, and my head just wasn?t on straight. I had burnt my tongue a bit on some unmentionable aromatic earlier in the day. I packed Caravan too loose. I over-compensated and tamped it too tight. I rushed it, but my semi-singed tongue suffered no further abuse in spite of this. In short, I committed all the newbie sins ? and Caravan let me get away with it. This is such a forgiving blend that it could easily be a ?first smoke? for a newbie. Sure, the complexity would be wasted on them at first, but look at the potential for growth! There are plenty of pipesters out there who have smoked only one blend their entire lives. If someone?s going to do that, why not make it one of the best?

For subsequent bowls, I made sure I was in full control of my faculties.

From charring light to finish, no one leaf dominates the flavor. It is more of being in a constant state of flux. Caravan kept me in a state of relaxed anticipation throughout.

Soft flavor, never-ending nuances. The flavors waft in and out throughout the bowl and make Caravan a delight to smoke. It packs well, it lights well, and it burns well. The bowl is nice and dry when you dump out the powdery-fine ash at the end.

This isn?t an all-day smoke, unless you can sit quietly all day and appreciate its incredible depth and complexity. Having tried all of the currently available Pease blends, I believe Caravan is #2 on my personal ?Favorite GLP Blends? list behind Raven?s Wing.

Update -04/08/04 I left this stuff alone for a few months and returned to it. The remainder had been sealed up and humidified as properly as I could manage. What I found surprised the $%#@ out of me. Indeed now I can taste the deeper complexity of sweet-sour-smokey tones under the latakia blast. I have been enjoying it very much. To the point that it may force me to kick out little brother Samarra as my favorite oriental. Of course I've left *that* alone for a few months too...

Physical Characteristics: A very short ribbon cut, predominately brown, mixed with some black and some lighter ribbons. Trickles into the bowl nicely and packs very easily.
Notes: Any Balkan style blend will eventually be compared to one of the Balkan Sobranie blends, and this one seems to be gathering comparisons to 759. Personally, I feel that if this was an attempt to recreate Sobranie 759, it has failed. Sobranie 759 was never this good. Where 759 had a mineral taste to it, this blend is pure and sweet. Caravan is obviously some high-quality weed, and I am afraid to smoke it carelessly, lest I miss some new development in the smoke. Layer upon layer of Oriental mystery make this blend not only a very satisfying smoke, but a highly entertaining one, when paid attention to. I would highly recommend this blend to any smoker, regardless of their tobacco preferences. English smokers will find a new member of their rotation, Va smokers will give Englishes a second chance, and Aromatic smokers will discover the wonderful tastes that unadorned tobacco can provide. Caravan will bring about world Pease. This, in my opinion, is the blend that will make the rest of the world sit up and recognise the immense talents of Mr. Gregory Pease.
Thank you Greg!

Tin aroma: Potent and intriguing. Similar to a fine liqueur in that it is wonderfully complex. I love the aroma and go nose-deep into the stuff every time I open the tin.

The touch is soft, almost silky.

Lights well, burns well.

The taste: Moderately complex and spicy. For me, this blend smokes consistently with a sweetness and nuttiness that come into play at various points during the bowl. Obviously blended of fine-grade leaf, this is a great blend of well-melded components yet, I yearn for something a little more out of this?.latakia ? a little more to suite my particular tastes, please. That said, I must admit I am a devout disciple of latakia and will pass on Caravan in favor of other blends by this esteemed blender that have a little more latakia.

I wish I had tried more balkan blends before this one so I could comment on it more intelligently, but what the hell. This is only the second tobacco I've tried which calls itself a "balkan mixture" and I suspect that this is more true to that genre than the first I tried (Frog Morton on the Bayou).

I love latakia. I love orientals. I love a decent sweet VA. I love a properly used air-cured leaf. This stuff is pretty much what I expected, and though I wasn't surprised with it I wasn't disappointed one bit either. In the tin it smells spicy and exotic (mostly latakia) with a somewhat unusual bit of sweetness. In the pipe (I mostly smoked this in a Savinelli bulldog/apple, sometimes with a balsa filter, and sometimes in an old calabash) it smokes about like it smells in the tin.

There's not much I can say about this that you can't guess from the description on the tin. No big surprises here and if it sounds appealing to you then it will smoke appealing as well.

Visual: An overall greenish tint to the tobacco gave me some concern at pre-light. A dull mixture of tobaccos of every color and an excessive amount of "dust" in the blend.

Texture: A bit dry to the touch, but plenty springy. This is a good sign in my opinion.

Pack/Pipe: Gravity fed with a medium firm tamp three times to keep the burn from getting out of control. Although I tend to prefer small to medium size pipes, this blend seemed to shine when I used taller/higher capacity bowls. I kept returning to a Ferndown Bark chimney, an Israeli Alpha Galaxy full bent and a Dunhill Redbark pot.

Lighting/Burn: One match to char, and often that was all that was needed. This stuff lights like fatwood! Very seldom did I need another match to get to the bottom. Burned quickly, but not as fast as I expected considering the moisture content and the large quantity of tobacco dust in the blend.

1st 3rd: That great Latakia aroma and a no kidding around tongue spanking (the good kind!) are what I get from the first few puffs. Burns through this first third quickly and leaves a pile of white/gray fluffy ash. The kind you just love to have for that first tamp.

2nd 3rd: More of the same. Nice Latakia taste, a bit nutty and good quantities of smoke. This level burns through relatively quickly as well. Sometimes I needed a pipe cleaner here to wick away a bit of moisture. More great ash.

Final 3rd: Occasionally I picked up a mineral taste and a bit of saltiness here. It may have been my smoking tempo to blame. Usually smoked to the bottom leaving just a few charred flakes and plenty of grainy gray ash.

Notes: I like this tobacco for its excellent taste, good burn quality, and the fact that I no longer have to explain my dislike of Pease blends. I have a number of tins of every Pease blend stocked away. I am looking forward to some of the other English blends that I have not yet tried.

Stogie rating of: 8 Pristine Punch

The tobacco is a short ribbon cut consisting of mostly brown ribbons with some light gold and some black pieces. The color of this tobacco actually reminds me of Squadron Leader with a touch more latakia.

Moisture level tends toward the dry side -- perfect for my tastes.

The taste of the tobacco is nutty. I am reminded of cashews or filberts. The blend is complex, with varying layers of flavor and a wonderful interchange between the orientals, virginias and latakia. The viginias lend a nice modicum of sweetness while the orientals and latikia fill out this blend.

I can't wait to try the other Pease blends that I am aging. Recommended.

I purchased this tobacco both on the strength of its ratings here on these pages, and because it is blended here in the sunny East Bay area, and I like to support local businesses. I find the packaging attractive and novel and have no problem with the shape of the cans, which remind me of the containers of snuff that were popular in Minnesota when I lived there and were on display at seemingly every grocer and drugstore.

Upon pulling back the foil ringtop(!) I'm greeted with lovely hues of yellow red and dark brown. The can aroma calls to mind trips to rural cider mills in my native Western NY State, although I'm not sure why, there is a leafy, very sweet, almost apple like aroma to it. There is no indication of Latakia whatsoever in this particular can, which I find mystifying considering the previous reviews. Perhaps the blend varies somewhat from can to can? I can identify russet and lemon virginias and not much else, although this is probably because I am not adept at tobacco identification on sight.

The tobacco packs nicely into my $29 straight Amadeus billiard, slightly long strands tamp right down.

The charring light produces nice puffs of white smoke, sweet and with many of the same notes as the can aroma, but with a bracing spiciness. Nicotine content seems on the medium to stout side. I am very happy at this point sitting in my thrift store chair listening to children play in the playground across the street.

Halfway through this pipe a bracing bitter note creeps into the smoke, its a pleasant bitter though, like maybe the impossible to find Moxie soda, bitter and sweet. The nicotine content is mellow and relaxing. There is a little gurgle here and I have to run a cleaner through the pipe to soak it up.

Towards the bottom of the pipe it starts to smoke a little hot, producing the only unpleasant moment of this pipe, a brief ammonia taste that disappears quickly. I can taste just a hint of latakia, but no smoky smell like English blends. It smokes down to grey ash.

All in all, this is a subtle experience indeed, I'll return to this one again and again, especially in midday smokes.