2009 Yunnan Sourcing 'Spring of You Le'

I think I pulled this sample out of the Puerh TTB. I wasn’t a huge fan of it. The leaves had a relatively light hay aroma to them. Once I brewed it up, the main flavor I got was hay with a touch of bitterness. The bitterness grew as the session continued, though I never found it particularly unpleasant. The unpleasant part of this tea for me was the finish which developed by about steep number three and lasted the whole rest of the time I spent with it. It was something funky – maybe mushroom or wet bark. I don’t mind some of these foresty flavors generally, but they were off in this tea. Maybe it’s at an awkward age or something, but this one just wasn’t for me.

Initial nose off the hot wet leaves is burly, with aromatic wood and a more subtle smoked character that fades directly into a very subtle and not-ouf-of-place cologne-like perfume. As the leaves cool, this settles into a musky sweetness with hints of the initial aroma. There aren’t any sour notes to this tea, which I often find and dislike in a lot of early-middle-aged teas around 2009/2010. I also feel like the way this tea is going to age is apparent, as if its on the cusp of going somewhere really nice. The current enjoyability of this tea, and the pleasantness of the early aged character made me excited enough to purchase a cake of this for some aging. Should be a nice show over the next few years.

PS Thanks to mrmopar for this sample. Learned a lot through a trade we made.

I actually did this two days ago so I am doing it again tonight.
I am pretty sure I grabbed this from Jasetea after roaming their website. A Yunnan Sourcing tea from 2009 and sold out on the YS sites.
I got all the shake and little pieces from inside the wrapper to brew with. I think it was about 12 grams and in the gaiwan to steep.
I rinsed it and let it sit about an hour before brewing to open the leaf up a bit.
This one is just about to get into the darker gold/copper color.
The brew was done in 3/3/3 sec brews. It sips light and goes quickly into a full thick almost oily coating with a nice good bitter punch to it. It gives some sweet but it is a while after sipping and the bitter subsides before this comes to front.
This one is turning into a good strong tea in its middle age. I will be interested into seeing how this ages in the future.