More like NY to SF. The Appalachians would be when you're first learning pointers and the Rockies would be about the time you hit the STL and friends.
The big difference between C++ and Rust is what happens when you get something wrong. C++ has lots of undefined behavior and nasty surprises for the unwary. (I led a C++ project for a decade and saw it all.) In Rust, if you get something wrong, the compiler typically refuses to compile it. Which is also very frustrating, but the frustration is all up front.