VERNON Maitland, owner of Excelsior Coaches, the company that pioneered the first continental coach holiday from Bournemouth, has died aged 92.

Vernon was born in Bournemouth and attended St John College, Hurstpierpoint from 1939-44. Although preferring sports to academics, he attended St Catherine’s College, Cambridge briefly before joining the RAF and earning his wings and commission at the RAF College Cranwell.

In 1947, he resigned from the RAF to join the family business as his father was well past retiring age. This was a coach company he started in the 1920s named Excelsior after a motorcycle, which had been frequently parked in his garage.

After spearheading the company’s growth by starting coach tours to Scotland in 1949 and mainland Europe in 1950, Vernon received permission in 1957 to operate the first ever coach tour to Moscow, filling two vehicles, driving one himself. The first night in the USSR coincided with the launch of the first Sputnik on October 1. By the following year, Excelsior was operating regular two-week tours to the Soviet Union and continued to do so for 25 years.

Vernon’s ambitions for the company went beyond the Iron Curtain, so in 1965 he undertook a recce to India in a VW Beetle, driving from London to Bombay and back in seven weeks. The ultimate goal had been Ceylon, Sri Lanka, but the attempt was foiled by an outbreak of war between India and Pakistan.

The same car then took him across Africa, first in 1966 on a journey that covered North Africa, from Morocco to Egypt, and then Beirut, across Turkey and back to the UK.

In 1968, in conjunction with Ford Motor Company to publicise a new coach chassis, Vernon organised a non-stop journey to Bombay with three drivers. Shortly afterwards Vernon offered to take a television camera crew to document the first London to Sydney Car Rally on the same route he had just travelled.

In 1970 Vernon and his wife, Monika, and three drivers drove a Ford coach and truck to Kabul, Afghanistan to pick up a pre-war Hawker Hind biplane – a gift from the Royal Afghan Air Force to the Shuttleworth Trust. This trip, together with the publicity journeys to Bombay and back in 17 days, resulted in the newly-rechristened Excelsior Holidays being awarded a contract with Penn Overland Tours to operate ten coaches a year to travel from London to Kathmandu.

In the 1970s and 80s, Vernon continued to explore and travel, much of it with the Skal Club, an international organisation for travel agencies. A member since 1947, he served as its National President from 1980-82 and was awarded the Skal Order of Merit.

Throughout the years, Excelsior Holidays continued to operate its normal programme of British and continental tours, as well as local tours and private.

At its peak the company carried almost 30,000 clients annually to over 80 different destinations. In 1981 Excelsior Holidays was the largest privately-owned coach operator in southern England, and Vernon as chairman was awarded the OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list.

In 1997, after 50 years at the helm of the business, Vernon decided to retire and sold the company with 60 Coaches, retaining the commercial properties from which the operations were run.

Vernon passed away at his home in Florida on Sunday, August 5.