Rick Hammersley had not seen a climb like this since June, when he descended out of the Rockies.
"These aren't hills, not compared to the Rocky Mountains," Hammersley said Thursday about Western Pennsylvania's mountains as he walked briskly along a narrow section of Route 60 in Crafton.
Hammersley, 60, a colon cancer survivor, has just started the seventh month of a cross-country walk for cancer research that has taken him from a California beach through mountains and plains and, yesterday, through Downtown.
The 3,700-mile walk is scheduled to end Nov. 2 at New York City's Coney Island boardwalk, where Hammersley plans to eat several Nathan's hot dogs.
Walking across the country was for years a vague goal of Hammersley, an Indianapolis gas line inspector who is on leave from work. He once considered walking the length of the Appalachian Trail.
"I decided against that. Too many weird animals. Not enough people. And I'm too old to sleep outside," he said.
Hammersley, who suffers from diabetes, became determined to walk across the country five years ago while undergoing a seven-month chemotherapy treatment.
"I felt so miserable then that I decided that I would do this walk if I ever felt better," he said.
More than 3,000 miles after starting his walk at the ocean in Bodega Bay, Calif., Hammersley's weight has dropped from 234 pounds to 181 pounds.
He has seven pairs of shoes and has worn through two of them.
Walking an average of 20 miles each day, Hammersley usually takes Saturdays off, "because that's when the crazies are driving." He once walked nine days in a row.
So far, Nevada has been his favorite state.
"The solitude there is amazing. You can walk an hour without seeing another car," Hammersley said as he walked along Steubenville Pike to Steuben Street.
California, where he was almost hit by vehicles several times, and Illinois, where most of the roads he walked had no shoulders, are his least favorite states.
Hammersley's wife of 39 years, Vanda, trails him in a 26-foot RV, which the two have parked overnight at campgrounds, by Wal-Mart stores, in church lots and at strip malls.
The two spent their first night in the Pittsburgh area in the parking lot of a carpet store, she said.
"It's a good adventure. It's amazing to me how nice people are," she said.
She wishes they had made the trip before the cost of gasoline soared. "We paid $4.39 per gallon in Nevada and $3.39 in Ohio the other day -- the lowest it's been on in the whole trip," she said.
Rick Hammersley has raised more than $7,000 in donations for Schaumburg, Ill.-based Gateway for Cancer Research.
He blogs about the trip nearly every day at rickwalksamerica.com. To see more of The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/. Copyright (c) 2008, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.
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