Last year, one of the nephews decided to leave his job and hike the trail. He walked the whole way, starting in Georgia. The sporadic reports he posted on FB when he was able to access the Internet allowed us to know that he was alive, well, and happy.
Apparently, there is a special culture on the AP. Each hiker somehow gets a nickname that they go by. There are places off the trail where the hikers can arrange in advance to have supplies and mail shipped. They are also a source for purchasing new supplies, shower a cooked meal (and a beer or two), and sometimes a real bed. The hikers often leave a short message in a community notebook with the date and their trail name. It’s a form of communication to fellow hikers. The “real” hikers don’t shave.
Since finishing up in Maine, he packed up and moved from Virginia to Colorado. He landed a job in his field of business, but all of his FB posts pertain to hiking in the Rockies.