| gar smokers, Nicaragua is already legendary. Through | | | | Augusto Sandino led an effort to expel them, which |
| regime change, social upheaval, and revolution, this | | | | was partially successful; but Anastasio Somoza |
| Latin American nation has produced some of the | | | | Garcia, a conservative, later secretly ordered his |
| world's finest tobacco. And since the post-1959 "cigar | | | | assassination, putting an end to a brief left-and-right |
| diaspora"—when many of Cuba's great cigar | | | | coalition government. The Somozas ruled until 1979, |
| makers fled the country to seek more propitious | | | | when a party named after that dead |
| conditions than those they expected to find under | | | | guerilla—the FSLN, or Sandinista |
| Castro—it's produced many of the world's | | | | party—ousted them from power. The wheel |
| finest cigars, too. | | | | turns again. And again: during the '80s, the country |
| Since 1959, Nicaragua has been a cigar powerhouse, | | | | was torn apart by war between the right-wing, |
| producing some of the highest-ranked and best-selling | | | | US-backed Contras and the left-wing, ruling |
| premium cigars in the world: CAO, Perdomo, Padron, | | | | Sandinistas (who, on the good side, reduced the |
| Don Pepin Garcia and Drew Estate among many | | | | country's widespread illiteracy by a stunning forty |
| others. It competes even with the wares of the | | | | percent within five months, but on the bad side, |
| Dominican Republic and Cuba, currently the cigar | | | | committed human rights violations during the civil |
| world's reigning superpowers. But there's a lot more | | | | war). |
| to this country than just great smokes: from the | | | | The Sandinistas, incidentally, almost destroyed the |
| marvelous ancient footprints of Acahualinca to the | | | | country's preeminence among cigar-tobacco growers. |
| fact that it was the first Latin American nation to | | | | In trying to put the desperately-poor, and politically |
| elect a woman President, Nicaragua has a history | | | | encircled, nation on a more secure economic footing, |
| worth knowing about—and one that may | | | | the Sandinistas ordered tobacco farmers to switch to |
| impact its future as a cigar lover's capital. | | | | cultivating cigarette tobacco. (This was before the |
| Roughly the size of New York, the country is rich in | | | | "cigar boom" of the 1990s; many observers |
| natural resources—so much so that nearly | | | | expected the market for cigars to continue to |
| twenty percent of its territory is taken up by one or | | | | dwindle.) Wherever a person may come down |
| another officially-designated nature preserve. | | | | politically, cigar smokers can agree that this was a |
| Predictably, this fertile and beautiful country has been | | | | mistake! |
| the subject of frequent political power struggles: first | | | | Both sides in the nation's long culture war were |
| between the various Spanish Conquistadores and the | | | | heavily hit in 1998 by Hurricane Mitch, one of many |
| indigenous population, which has had a presence in | | | | natural disasters to wreak havoc on this beleaguered |
| the area for at least six thousand years and was | | | | country. After decades of civil war had handicapped |
| nearly wiped out by 1529. Nicaragua was later | | | | its economy and wrecked much of its infrastructure, |
| annexed by the Mexican Empire, finally achieving | | | | this cataclysmic hurricane did away with nearly |
| independence in 1838; since then, rival conservative | | | | seventy percent of the infrastructure still standing at |
| and liberal factions have fought each other for | | | | the time. |
| control of the country's destiny. There was civil war | | | | Under the circumstances, it's amazing that Nicaragua |
| during the 1840s and '50s, during which an American | | | | continues to enjoy the regional importance that it |
| pretender, William Walker, briefly declared himself the | | | | does—but sometimes amazing things happen. |
| country's leader after double-crossing the Liberals | | | | Nicaragua makes three hundred million in exports |
| who had recruited him to fight in the war. (Several | | | | every year (mostly agricultural), boasts one of the |
| Latin American countries' armies united to chase him | | | | best-regarded rums in Latin America (Flor de Cana), |
| out of the country the following year, in 1856.) | | | | enjoys a flourishing tourism industry and, of course, |
| This pattern—conservative-vs.-liberal infighting, | | | | makes some truly heavenly tobacco. Though it's |
| with occasional interference from the nearest world | | | | considered a developing nation, it did recently earn a |
| power—continued through the twentieth | | | | ranking from the World Bank as the sixty-second |
| century. A US-backed Conservative regime ruled for | | | | best place to start a new business—the |
| decades early in the century, with Marines occupying | | | | highest-performing Central American country in this |
| the country from 1912 to 1933. Left-wing guerilla | | | | particular ranking, except for Panama. |