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A Visit to CIGARfest 2018 Pig Roast Chowdown

CIGARfest 2018 is in the books and over the next three weeks, Cigar Intel is publishing our take on three events: Pig Roast Chowdown, the Main Event, and Bales & Ales 2.0. Don’t miss the pictures and video in this post so you can get a real feel for the event.

Cigars Internationals CIGARfest 2018 took place from Thursday, May 3rd, 2018 through Sunday, May 6th, 2018 at various locations in Pennsylvania. Most of the events were at Split Rock Resort in Lake Harmony, PA. Yep, in the Poconos. The remaining events were at the various Cigars International stores in PA. This was the 15th year for the event and CIGARfest is one of the biggest cigar events in the world with 6,000 attendees. As far as cigar events in the United States go, this is one you MUST attend at least once.

The Pig Roast Chowdown occurred on Thursday, May 3rd, 2018 from 12:00 pm – 5:00 pm. Smokey and I attended this event with somewhere around 100 of our closest friends. This one was not a sellout, probably since it was on a Thursday but was still a lot of fun.

The Pig Roast Chowdown included BBQ, drink samples, a live blues band, cigar, and games. Altadis USA sponsored the event and everyone received an H Upmann by AJ Hernandez cigars and a baseball cap that matched the color scheme of the cigar band.

Pig Roast Chowdown Swag
Note: Lighter and Cutter NOT included!

The BBQ was catered and included exactly what you would expect for catered BBQ. It wasn’t great but I didn’t die from food poisoning so I guess I’ll give it a thumbs up. Unlike at the Main Event, the line was short.

The blues band was great. Unfortunately, the music was way too loud for the space. I’d like to tell you the name of the band but all I heard was (*&JIUUDNI#*kjeoickeiei3dd!. Smokey and I sat at the table furthest from the band and still had to yell at each other to have a conversation. I said, “huh?” at least 100 times during the event.

Altadis USA offered two cigar specials at the event. The first special was called the “Altadis Collection” and included Romeo y Julieta, H Upmann, and Montecristo cigars while the “Boutique Blend Collection” included Aging Room cigars. Purchasing the cigar specials included a torch lighter, cutter, free sampler, and raffle tickets depending on how many cigar deals you purchased. The deals were pretty darn good at $50 for a ten pack of cigars. Check out the first picture in this post for more info on the deals.

To play the Minute-to-Win-It Showdown, contestants were selected from a raffle. To obtain raffle tickets, attendees had to buy a pack of the cigars on sale. Winning the raffle resulted in a position at the game tables. The games were pretty entertaining, including throwing ping-pong balls at a piece of bread covered in peanut butter. The first one to get a ping-pong ball to stick to the peanut butter won a nice prize.

Check out the video below for a 360-degree view of the event, as well as one of the Minute-to-Win-It Showdown games.

This Pig Roast Chowdown was pretty entertaining. The cigar deals were great and the games were a lot of fun.

Check out all the Cigar Events in the United States HERE.

c.gar

c.gar loves all things cigar-related. He typically falls in love with cigars that are discontinued shortly thereafter. His first cigar was a Swisher Sweet with a wood tip. Sadly, these are still in production.

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