Review Notes: Let me start by saying I am not much of a fan of Dominican tobacco. And in Canada, even moderately priced cigars are expensive. At almost $30 this was an expensive lesson. This stick is huge. It's almost a joke at about 7 inches and 60 ring ga. The wrapper was claro and was light and papery but smooth in appearance (small veins) but had some colour blemishes. The construction was reasonable but the cap had some ratty edges and tasted like glue. The foot was indeed shaggy with a visible blend of light and dark fillers. I was surprised the wrapper could contain all those wily filler leaves. Ok, now to the tasting. The XO smelled nice with notes of light tobacco and a hint of cognac, but tasted foul on first light. The draw was so loose it was hard to get much flavour for all the air moving through this stick. After about 2.5 inches it started to improve in flavour, but to it's credit, this massive cigar burned evenly throught, had a nice solid white ash and burned with a fine black line between ash and body. The taste was light but gad frequent bitter lashes and tasted of wicked ash for the first few inches. Not impressive. Then, at almost halfway, it became the cigar I think they were trying to create. The smoke became creamy and slightly sweet on the finish, showing off the soft, aged tobacco and again cognac. It almost tasted like marginal drip coffee with French vanilla creamers, which made me wonder if the flavour profile is appropriate for such aged tobacco, but this is a Gurkha, and clearly a phenomenon cigar, not a classic. I smoked it to about an inch though and found myself wanting more, which can be taken two ways. I don't know if I would do it again, and certainly not for the price I paid up here in sin tax haven, but despite itself, I can at least say that this cigar probably accomplished what it was intended to be. I should have bought the Bolivar belicoso instead... I had to fight the taste of Dominican tobacco for at least half the cigar before getting any richness, and then only for a light-med body theme cigar. Expensive lesson.