Coggin Travels -

Maureen Ragland

Cindy's knowledge and expertise were were instrumental in helping us select our initial European river cruise. The cruise line and itinerary were perfect for us, and I would highly recommend utilizing Cindy's guidance for future trips. This was our first time taking a river cruise. We enjoyed the history, culture and food in the South of France. Cindy your description and experience helped us enjoy a great time and alleviate any concerns we had traveling to France. Thank you so much for all your time. We truly appreciate your service in setting up a special vacation.

Anthony Alvizu

We initially started planning our weeklong Sicily trip for our group of seven (7) on our own. We had not been to Sicily before, so we had no contacts (e.g., guides, boat operators, property companies) and were researching things from scratch.

In speaking with Cindy Coggin at Coggin Travels, Cindy said, “why aren’t you asking me to help.” It was a very timely and good question!

We provided Cindy with some initial thoughts and requests – we wanted to visit Palermo and Taormina, take in a Godfather tour, explore some wineries, and schedule daily activities but did not have specifics other than Mt. Etna and the Greek Theater in Taormina. And we needed places to stay!

To our pleasant surprise, Cindy came back to us with activities we had not thought about or known how to go about arranging:
• Connected us with an outstanding, informative, and affable local travel service/agent who stayed with us/drove us the entire week of our stay between towns, to and from activities, transfers to and from airports, made us dinner, set us up with local tour guides and more! Looking back on it, we could not imagine navigating Sicily without our agent’s direction and company!
• Winery tour, wine tasting and pizza making class at Augustali Farm!
• Guided walking tour of Palermo with visits to the Palazzo dei Normanni (Royal Palace) and the Palermo Cathedral capped off with a lunch of local street food!
• A stop in Cefalù with a guided tour and lunch on our way from Palermo to Taormina.
• Guided walking tour of Savoca and the Godfather filming sites.
• Guided Jeep tour of Mt. Etna with winery tour, tasting and lunch (Gambino Vini).
• Guided walking tour of Taormina to include San Domenico Palace (think White Lotus!) and the Greek Theater.

We later researched a jewelry manufacture in Giarre and asked Coggin Travels to incorporate a visit. Cindy said no problem and arranged for our visit and added it to our itinerary.

We said we wanted a boat ride in Taormina and Cindy came back with a wonderful wooden boat tour off the Taormina coast with the opportunity to visit Isola Bella, swim in the Ionian Sea, and take part in aperitivo on the boat!

Cindy found two wonderful places for us to stay - a boutique bed and spa in Palermo in the heart of the city in walking distance to key sites and activities and a lovely apartment in Taormina with a full rooftop deck that afforded us with amazing views of the sea (and the location of a wonderful home cooked meal of local Sicilian favorites). The apartment was within walking distance of the heart of Taormina’s Main Street and sites.

It goes without saying we had a wonderful trip – a dream! We plan to use Coggin Travels again!

Ginny Lyles

Jeff Coggin and Rachel Forst did a great job for us turning lemons into lemonade. Our trip to Egypt was cancelled and we did not want to lose the non-refundable airfare on Turkish Airlines so we decided to go to Greece. We are experienced travelers and had been to Greece before so we had Rachel book our hotels and we planned the rest of the trip. Rachel booked us into the Athens Gate Hotel which turned out to be perfectly located to walk to most attractions as well as close to 2 of our favorite restaurants. The Vintage Wine Bar and Restaurant is an amazing wine place with over 1000 wines for tasting. The food is excellent and perfect for sharing. The servers are knowledgeable about the wines, vineyards, grapes, etc. A lovely evening. Our other favorite place is Opa Apollas for fresh seafood and a fantastic beetroot salad plus delicious house wines. We flew to Crete and stayed at a lovely boutique hotel, Lato, that has a great rooftop bar. From Crete, we took a ferry to Santorini and stayed at the Hotel Belvedere. Take note - 107 steps to the suite and the bedroom was up a flight of stairs. We did ask to be moved to a room all on one level since our knees were not up to that many steps! We found a wonderful driver who took us on a great tour of the island - we gave him a list of what we wanted to see and and he took us everywhere including a great winery of local wines. Plus we ate at several restaurants on my list including one that was literally across from the hotel, Mama Thira. Toholoto and To Briki were excellent restaurants that we stumbled upon. Hubby truly bonded with the bartender at the bar and was sad to say goodbye. We also got to experience the Sahara sand storm that hit Greece while we were in Santorini. Mykonos was lovely and here again, the Hotel Semeli is perfectly situated for walking to where we wanted to go. I wanted the day trip to Delos and went by myself because the others wanted a spa day. I had a fabulous time at Delos and it was so easy to walk to the port and catch the ferry. When in Mykonos, be sure to check out Sale e Pepe - lovely family owned restaurant with great food.
The staff everywhere are so friendly with amazing customer service skills. It helped that we were there a week before the season starts. Lots of times, we were the only people in restaurants and bars and no big crowds at the sites we visited. A little chilly but we had packed for all kinds of weather. Many thanks to Rachel for helping us plan a lovely trip.

Mark Balling

We had the trip of a lifetime to Italy and Croatia! Many thanks to Jeff and Cindy for arranging the itinerary, and guidance on great wines!!

Bradley Olson

Attention to details and personalizing experiences catered to our tastes is a gift from Coggin Travels! We thoroughly enjoyed a river cruise in France without complications- from the airlines, to hotels, excursions, transfers, and cruise line- The trust we had in Jeff and Cindy to take care of these and any surprises that came our way made the trip all that more enjoyable. Thank You Coggin Travels!

tammy Broxson

Coggin Travels planned a long trip to France for us and other friends and family. They did a great job! The wine experiences were incredible before and after a great Rhone River wine cruise.

Helen Rancich

Dear Jeff and Cindy,
What an amazing trip we had! Our sincere gratitude for your help in planning our French/Rhône river cruise. We are certain that your personal, hands-on attention and expertise to our needs made our trip special. You were invaluable, and we could not have asked for a better travel advisors.
Beautiful cities were visited and the excursions were plentiful for our varied interests. The riverboat crew was courteous and attentive and the food and wine pairings were exquisite.
Our private wine sommelier and additional wine tastings expanded our knowledge We also appreciate the personalized wines you brought to our dinners.
Thank you again, we had a trip of a lifetime, and we highly recommend you to our family and friends. Until we travel again, Helen and Joe

Sara Powell

Highly recommend Coggin Travels for planning any trip! Jeff was fantastic and shifted gears with us several times before finally choosing a European cruise for our vacation. He sat down with me for two hours to look at all of our options and we decided on the boat, place, and timeline that best fit our wants/needs. Jeff planned an awesome itinerary and the travel app was very helpful throughout our trip! He was patient, kind, and fun to work with! Thank you Jeff & Coggin Travels for an amazing vacation!