Taxi fare of a lifetime: New York cabbie takes businessmen to LA

A New York taxi driver has picked up the fare of all fares. Two businessmen asked driver Mohammed Alam to drive them across the US, stopping off at Las Vegas en route and finishing in Los Angeles.

John Belitsky, an investment banker, and his accomplice Dan Wuebben said he and his friend wanted to do something "magical". They negotiated with Mr Alam at New York's LaGuardia Airport, who agreed on a tariff of $5,000. The meter was not running throughout the epic journey and the cash had been paid up front. Mr Belitsky, of Leonia, New Jersey, and Mr Wuebben, of Queens, New York, are currently on vacation in Los Angeles and have not decided which method of travel they will take to return to the Big Apple, reports BBC North America. Mr Alam has a friend flying out to help him drive his cab back 2,462 miles (3,961 km) to the east coast. During the six-day trip the friends stopped over at Las Vegas and won nearly half the fare back in the casinos. The whole trip was micro-blogged on Twitter. While in Las Vegas on Friday, the businessman tweeted: "Woke up Alam to a shower of $100 bills at sunrise." The pair had won a total of $2,000. In Taxi Driver Online blog, it was estimated that, had the meter ran throughout the coast-to-coast journey it would have totalled around $17,000.