"Bahìa de Caraquez - Tarantula encounter" Ecuador Travelogue by lenoreva

I spent a week in Bahìa on an AFS short term exchange. Nathalie (from France) and I stayed with a family near the beach. The father ran the local radio station (located next door to the house) and the mother worked at the telephone central downtown (free calls for me!). Although the house had no running water, the maid brought in a huge bucketfull of fresh water 3 times a day. The house also had a severe insect infestation problem. One night after returning from partying, Nathalie and I were very hungry, so we decided to check out the fridge. We were horrified to find insects crawling all over the uncovered food. The remaining days were spent without much of an appetite for the food from this house!!

Our scariest and most memorable "critter" encounter occured our last night. Returning from my sponge bath, I was somewhat startled to see Nathalie with her back against the wall pointing at the opposite side of the room in horror. My eyes followed her frantic motions and my heart skipped a beat when I saw a huge, hairy tarantula crawling lazily along the wall. Nathalie wanted me to kill it, but there was no way I was going anywhere near the creature. Eventually, after some debate of our options, fatigue took over and we got into bed and fell asleep. In the morning, our new friend was gone, and we were prepared to take our trip back to Quito.