Who We Are
The Gateway to Incredible Adventures
Coasters & Castles Travel was created by high school friends, Lynne Macolini and April Botta. Lynne and April both share the “Disney gene,” a passion for all things Disney and an obsession to learn as much about Disney destinations as possible. Both had vast experience planning personal trips as well as trips for family and friends for years.
Lynne began professionally helping clients with their Disney destination travel after being laid off from her job and seeing a friend’s travel business on Facebook. She had found her dream job and was excited to join an agency to further develop her travel planning expertise.
April had a similar start to the business, being also laid off and noticing on Facebook that Lynne was a travel agent specializing in Disney Destinations. She had been trying to think of how to turn her Disney obsession into a business and was excited to learn it was actually possible. With Lynne’s help, she joined the same agency.
They started working together at vendor shows almost immediately and learned that they worked really well together. They found they shared many of the same values and principles, and complemented each other and could fill in each other’s thoughts. While at a show, April mentioned that she would like to open her own agency someday. Lynne laughed because she had the same plan. April and Lynne went from someday to 10 years from now, to 5 years from now, to "I think we are ready, let’s do it." They started the research on what was needed to do to make it happen. Thus began a lot of hard work, meetings, and notes to develop an organization that they could be proud to own and call their own.
April & Lynne's work experience, natural skillsets, and education complement each other brining a broad range of talent to the agency. Lynne holds a BS in Business Management and a MS in Leadership and has over 10 years of management experience and 20 years of experience in the financial industry. April has over 20 years of retail management, marketing, training and personnel development experience. They have both been to Walt Disney World over 18 times, have been on Disney Cruises, and have been to Disneyland. They look forward to their first adventures at Aulani and an Adventures by Disney destination. Both April and Lynne have earned their CTA (Certified Travel Associate) certification from The Travel Institute.
On January 5, 2016, Their dream was made a reality. They opened Coasters & Castles Travel. They are determined to make this a unique experience for agents/ advisors and for our clients. Training and support are the cornerstone of what they want for our agents/ advisors. They pride themselves on providing an experience for their agents/ advisors, where they can develop and growth and they believe in maintaining a family culture within the agency. They do not and will not ever have sales quotas. They believe in investing in their agents/ advisors, and welcome contributions from the team to make Coasters & Castles Travel a truly great organization.
Coasters & Castles Travel was honored in 2018 with a new designation. They earned the distinction of being “Earmarked” by Disney. That means they are an “Authorized Disney Vacation Planner”. This is a great honor and responsibility.
In June of 2019, Coasters & Castles Travel was honored with the President’s Award from Travel Leaders. This award was in recognition of their huge sales growth in 2018.
In January 2020, the agency expanded into two new specialties Cruises (Ocean & River) and All-Inclusive Resorts. There are plans to expand into a couple more specialties in the next several years.
In July of 2020, the agency was honored with the invitation by Universal Orlando Resort to be a “U-Preferred Partner”. This is similar to the Earmarked program that Disney has and are very excited for this opportunity.