Ken, thanks for giving us all easy access to the photos and videos of Phil's trip. From the standpoint of geography, I am amused by some of your probably intentional errors. For example:
This is Day 36. Phil goes from Pittsburgh, PA into Frostburg, MD. Phil goes up some 11,500 feet. Wow. And Phil loses it a bit.
I think that is possible, but he would have to ride elevators in Pittsburgh for a long time to do that. The highest
point in Pennsylvania is Mt. Adams in the southwest part of the state at 3213 feet. Just a bit shy of 11,500 feet, which can't even be done in Colorado due to the base level of the 14,000 foot peaks being well above 5,000. It can be done in California but only at a place like Mt. Whitney with a low base below a high mountain or Alaska or Hawaii.
Now maybe you mean counting the same elevation gain multiple times with going down before going up again. The total uphill portion of multiple hills or mountains could exceed 11,500 feet even if no individual peak was more than 1/4 of that.
Pennsylvania does has many small hills. Anybody who has ever driven Interstate 80 from Delaware Water Gap all the way to the Shenango River at its western edge can attest to this. It would be the same crossing southwest Pennsylvania from Pittsburgh to Cumberland MD.