orley
Junior Member
Posts: 446 
First Name: Paul
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Post by orley on Nov 8, 2017 11:57:55 GMT -5
Sometimes I get a little OCD about things. Here's one example; about a year ago I bought a tin of the latest release of Lane's Crown Achievement and put it up. I was waiting for a reason to open it up, but I already have so many blends open I just quit thinking about it. Ok, now I just recently picked up a rather nice looking pipe called Crown Achievement, not the rare one by Charatan, but it did have the Lane logo on the stem. So $16 later I owned the pipe. Then l went on search for info about it. Turns out that a bunch of stummels made before 1980 were discovered in Belgium, but Hilson of Holland ended up with them. Anyway, long story short, they finished the pipes, and somehow Lane got in the picture, and they were sold as the pipe you see now. You see where I'm going with this? Yup, a reason to open the tin of Crown Achievement tobacco! The tobacco was nothing spectacular but was a very good English blend that was rather mild with noticeable Latakia in the tin note, but not so much in the smoke, (just my opinion). Was a little dry and produced lots of smoke, but was a nice relaxing blend. Oh, and the pipe smoked great too! Anyone else have one of these pipes?  |
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Post by trailboss on Nov 8, 2017 14:03:31 GMT -5
Correct... A few years ago, Smokingpipes buyer ran across a bunch of unfinished pipes at about the same time the Crown achievement was re-introduced, and I picked up one...for $100.00 a buyer got a pound of Crown Achievement and a pipe...it was a really good deal, and my Dublin is a great smoker!  But, $16.00 is a better deal. SP had some of these pipes still available about a year ago, I should have pulled the trigger. |
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Post by Darin on Nov 8, 2017 14:22:46 GMT -5
Yep ... 2 Hilson Vintage and 2 Crown Achievement pipes here.
All good smokers and purchased for around $40 to 60 each.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2017 14:31:05 GMT -5
Congrats & Enjoy. I know those pipes are well regarded. For anyone shopping Estates, Hilson pipes are a bit of a sleeper stateside. They are a good value and VG smokers.
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Post by Darin on Nov 8, 2017 14:50:12 GMT -5
Yep ... 2 Hilson Vintage and 2 Crown Achievement pipes here. All good smokers and purchased for around $40 to 60 each.  |
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Post by sparks on Nov 8, 2017 18:24:59 GMT -5
Disappointing to hear that the Crown Achievement was just "meh". The original (my B&M back home had a stash of it) was a Latakia bomb as I recall.
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Post by papipeguy on Nov 8, 2017 18:29:45 GMT -5
At one time CA was the most expensive blend in the world. I used to go to the Lane store on 42nd Street in NY for my usual blend (Highland) and once i a while I'd get a 1 Lb tin of CA for about $20.00. Highland cost me about $ 6.00 for a 1 lb can.
When Lane wanted to re-release CA I sent some samples of 20 year old CA to them for reference and got a 5 tin pack as a thank you. Classy thing to do as I didn't want anything for my contribution.
Is the new CA like the old one? Of course not, because of the many changes in supply of the varietals over the years but I still found it to be a good smoke.
As a footnote, I did ask about my beloved Highland but the recipe has been lost to time.
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orley
Junior Member
Posts: 446
First Name: Paul
Location:
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Post by orley on Nov 8, 2017 19:59:35 GMT -5
I hear you John. The funny thing about CA is the more I smoke it, the more I like it, so thank you for your contribution to this blend. I find it interesting that it was once so expensive. I've never tried the original, but was it really better than other such blends at the time? The pipe itself's history is interesting too. Every now and then old stock is found and brought out for sale to prove that not only are they as good smoking as new ones, but sometimes better!
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Post by papipeguy on Nov 8, 2017 21:36:12 GMT -5
Paul, back in the day Lane made some very high quality blends and their English blends were very good. When RJR took them over they decimated the pipe business and many of the good blends disappeared. Was CA worth the price? Probably not but it did get you bragging rights among other pipe smokers.
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