Wuyi Origin recommendations?

Shipping to the UK is super quick. Last time Cindy sent it it took 3 1/2 days door to door, and that was over a weekend!

got my order yesterday!

I got three free gifts:
Old Bush Ya Shi Xiang,
Que She,
and Qi Lan

Can’t wait to try them :D

Cindy’ wild lapsang souchong is the best black tea I have ever had ,every year is quite stable quality ,but i think this harvest is amazing .
xing renxiang dancong ,Tuofuhou dancong ,Old bush Shuixian dancong are all very good quality tea with strong tea body and super clean mouthfeel with deep Shan yun .Wuyi Rock tea ,I ordered Bu zhichun and Rougui and Shuixian.No surprise，I love them all.Really no easy to find such great quality

I loved the laocong shuixian yancha and laocong milanxiang so I reordered. Also this year’s wild lapsang souchong was powerful! Blew my socks away.
I’m going to try for the first time the xinren and tuofuhou – really excited based on Mao Yinhui Javen’s comments above. How is Buzhichun? I’ve heard some good things about it but it wasn’t available when I placed my order.

I must remember to order this buzhichun next time!

I had recently ordered quite a few of Cindy’s teas on offer. I must say I am highly impressed by the quality of the teas. Although I am not much an experienced drinker, I must say I am hooked to the Wild Lapsang Souchong 2018. I have tried the normal smoked variety over the years and so I wasn’t expecting much, but I was blown away by this unsmoked version. There is so much depth and dimension to this tea that’s different from the regular lapsangs. The fragrance hints of a ‘macro’ mix between peach/ plum, orchid and honey and other in-between notes. Throughout many steeps, the fruity aroma lingers and the taste is consistent. This tea gave at least 6 -7 steeps (gong-fu style) with the same level of consistent and satisfying taste and after which it began to taper off slightly – and I don’t really do flash brews. Incidentally, I came to know later through Cindy that this is a prize winner (3rd place) among 200 odd competitors! I will be looking out for her 2019 wild lapsang.

Other teas that are highly impressive are the Rou Gui and Honey Aroma JJM. I’m not a big fan of smoked oolongs, but I can say that they are of top quality and Cindy is proud of her Oolongs. Highly recommended teas and a graceful producer.

All of that definitely matches my impression, even the specific favorites; to me those three teas stand out. Dan Cong is the only range I’d add to that; they sell teas that are among the best versions I’ve yet to try. It’s odd that they carry that range, given the Wuyishan tea theme, but the background explains it: Cindy is from Wuyishan, and her husband is from Chaozhou, or in the tea producing area closest to that. She and her husband work on both harvest and production seasons, enabled by slight changes in local climate and Spring taking effect at a slightly different time-table.

As to them as a vendor, the only drawback seems to be that market rates for teas of that quality level run higher than lower (medium) quality versions do. Their teas seemed underpriced in the first couple of years of conducting direct online business, and it’s my impression that they didn’t judge the cost of maintaining a business channel with limited sales volume correctly.

A bit of background may not be familiar to everyone here, so I’ll pass on my own impression, which of course is based on limited exposure. Teas don’t cost less in China. I’ve only visited China twice, so I’m no expert, but per that exposure and from having friends living in China I’ve come to understand that the demand for better teas is significant there, and awareness of tea options is higher.

An American or Westerner might think that the cost of living is generally lower in most places in Asia (and that is true), but it’s easy to miss that a lot things cost more in Asia than when purchased in the US. Nike running shoes or Legos cost more in Bangkok, for example. I won’t go further into why that is, sorting supply and demand issues from variations in tariffs, but the simple point helps explain why it’s not a given that buying anything directly from China should relate to paying only a fraction of the Western cost for the same thing.

I’m not clear on other options for any teas equivalent in quality to Wuyi Origin’s, but that part also gets too complicated to untangle. Evaluating that would require a level of background that not many individuals possess.

Some exciting news for fans of Wuyi Origin – Cindy told me she is currently offering free shipping on all orders this month (usually $10) and that she’s going to add more 2019 teas to the website, including some rare cultivars from Wuyishan. I couldn’t resist placing an order for myself after I heard that :D So I’ve ordered a variety of black wuyis, plus 2018 blended da hong pao after reading many positive comments and a couple of dancongs. Cindy says her 2019 milanxiang, yashi and xingren are even better than last year’s, so it’s very exciting for us dancong aficionados.