The Left Coast is Smoking!
Last week it was several days in Vegas for my cigar smoking ash, but ya gotta move on in life, and where else but a trip to the land of fruit, nuts, and honey granola. My buddy Denny joined me in Vegas via car, and he was my chauffeur as we trekked across the desert towards the city of angels. This was my first ever trip down Interstate 15 through the Mojave, and the scenery while breath taking, is pretty damned eerie and you’d swear that you were cruising on the face of Mars.
As we hit the California border, I turned to my faithful dog Toto and reminded him that we were definitely not in Jersey anymore. After hours of driving the surface of the red planet, we finally ascended upon the big city, and the first impression for anyone who navigates a car thru Los Angeles is 
that yes, indeed, the traffic sucks like a Hoover. As we bob and weave thru a myriad of hybrid green mobiles, I’m already thinking about finding a place to smoke cigars in a state that is as smoke UN-friendly as it gets.
We arrived at our motel, a scathing little crap-hole just two miles from Venice Beach (quite the antitheses of the stunning Wynn Encore – a grotesque understatement.) And while food is most important to my existence, a premium cigar holds equal weight. I make a call to my Cali pal, Eric, who is a director from the area, and better yet, a local dude who knows the lay of the land.
“Yeah, Zman,” he says with exuberance, “there’s a great place to hang and smoke cigars right here in Venice!”
Thank God for good friends as we enjoyed a Mexican dinner, mucho cervesa, and then a trip to Hollywood Tobacco, just a robusto’s throw from the Pacific Ocean. The lounge was rocking with a few local herfers, as well as a New Yorker and a dude from Chicago as we yakked and enjoyed premium tobacco throughout the evening. Some poor La Gloria Serie R’s gave up their lives for a noble cause.
The following day I got a chance to sit in on a live taping of the Chelsea Lately Show, which was a load of fun. Chelsea Handler is a pisser and my kids even saw me on tv in the audience! I then had a 6 o’clock meeting at a restaurant in Beverly Hills, but it was only 4pm, and with two hours to kill, I broke out the netbook and searched the web for a smoke shop in the land of the posh and mega-wealthy. So, I found just that at the Buena Vista Cigar Club. A wonderful gent named Rigo, a Cuban escapee, is the proprietor of this terrific shop with the big wooden Indian out front, who I got quite friendly with (get your mind out of the gutter, ya dirtbag.) You’d think in 90210 this place would be a trendy little nouveau riche joint for the beautiful people, but it’s actually quite the opposite. The place is a throwback – wooden bar and paneling on the walls, with old leather high-back chairs, and a cool loft upstairs for more smoking privacy. Plus there’s a full selection of whiskies, scotches, and tasty wines. The place is a rare gem amongst the hoity-toity.
When the day was done, we hoped back in the car and took the three hour drive to San Diego for a whole other adventure in cigar land.
We’ll talk about it next week, my peeps,
Tommy Z,
JR Cigars Blog With the Zman
