There's a story at MyTelus about a guy who is flying more-or-less non-stop for 2 months to get 1 million air-miles, enough to take 10 round-trip executive class flights to Australia. Air Canada offers an unlimited North America pass for $3500 a month, which allows unlimited travel to over 100 US destinations.

He has the whole thing figured out, down to the total number of air points he's racking up each day. He even manages to spend three nights a week sleeping in his own bed in Vancouver and will have the million points in the bag within 50 days. "I'm flying about 7,500 miles or points a day," he explained. "But I hold super-elite status so it multiplies out at 2.75. I'm doing 19,000 points a day.

The "trick" is to spend the day flying back and forth between Vancouver and Victoria and Vancouver and Nanaimo. "They are short trips that last about 15 minutes. They garner a minimum 500 miles." By contrast, a flight to Calgary also garners 500 points but takes almost 90 minutes.

As soon as he arrives, he gets back on the return flight to Vancouver, arriving in time to resume the daily grind of flying to Vancouver Island and back. Even more astounding is the fact Tacchi takes 36 hours out of the odyssey to do his job. He works for another airline, flying a 767 cargo jet to Europe once a week.

"It's about a $70,000 value, all for a $7,000 investment," said Tacchi. "I figure a million miles will basically cover my travel for the next three to four years."