Our Aussie Angel, not to be confused with Thorpe´s Angels

I believe I made mention of our lovely Australin friend Philip in a previous post, but after dining with him four evenings in a row he deserves his own posting.
He earned his name on the afternoon we arrived to Aguas Calientes. Lost and tired and hungry and shut out from getting our Machu Picchu tickets until an hour later we were grouchy wanderers. Being the true New Yorkers we are when we heard someone yelling "Manhattan! Americans!" we did not turn around. It wasnt until the poor guy took off running to catch up with us that we realized it was our dear friend Philip. He very kindly took us to his hotel and gave us a map of the city and showed us where to get all of our tickets, where our hotel was and how to exchange our train tickets to take an earlier one home. Lifesaver moment number 1. We parted ways thinking oh we{ll hopefully run into him again. Well later that night post internet cafe we were sitting on the street when low and behold, there is Philip. We agreed to meet for dinner and ended up shutting down the restaurant (this kind of became our style in the last few days). We had some lovely Peruvian wine (Philip is a connosieur! thought he won{t admit it) and great conversation, and again, parted ways. Early early the next morning, 530ish again, we run iinto Philip on our way to Machu Picchu. We each did our own hikes there and then almost like clockwork when we went to get lunch, there he was, our Aussie Angel. IT got to the point that we{d get disappointed if we didn{t run into him. So we all had a fabulous dinner at a Hare Krishna restaurant that night and once again shut it down. We all traveled back to Ollantytambo together but Philp, being wise, stuckaround the town and got to see a festival. lucky man. But we all had our farewell dinner last night in Cusco, and, shock, shut the restaurant down. I will take some responsibility for that since they had Knob Creek bourbon and i got excited. (dad you would have been proud! haha). But the highlight of our dinner was when Philip presented Steph and i with two lovely watercolor paintings he had picked up in the market at Ollantytambo for us. IT was the sweetest gesture adn we were incredibly touched. And i{m sure you{re embarrassed thta i{m gushing about you PHilip, but you deserve it. Philip hails from Adelaide, Australia and beyond being a wine connesieur and world traveler truly was like our guardian angel these past few days. So Philip, thank you. We are so so grateful to have met you! have fun in Cuba!! and remember, Viva las Vegas! well see you for the elvis festival! haha