MOST people bring back souvenirs from their holidays. But what Kevin Gilvary picked up on his trek through a South American jungle would not grace anyone's mantlepiece.

Three months after the Hampshire schoolteacher returned from tropical Peru he was horrified to find an inch-long bug emerging from his back.

In a scene straight out of a horror film, the parasite hatched from near his shoulder blade while he was changing the dressing on what he thought was a mosquito bite.

Kevin said: "I was looking at the bite in the mirror when I saw a yellowish head sticking out and wiggling. I called my partner Christine and with one squeeze, the larva popped out on to a tissue. I put it inside a sealed jar and spent the next half an hour watching it wriggle around."

Kevin, 47, of Rosedale Close, Titchfield, picked up the bug while revisiting Peru after spending several years teaching there in the 1980s.

It was as he and Christine trekked through the jungle alongside the Amazon River that Kevin remembers being stung.

He said: "Suddenly I felt a sharp sting, and my partner Christine saw a large beetle flying away. It had stung my left shoulder blade through my shirt. Christine put some antiseptic cream on the bite but when I returned to Britain, it was quite swollen and very itchy."

Although back at work as an English teacher at the Barton Peveril College in Eastleigh the wound continued to irritate Kevin. A course of antibiotics was prescribed by his doctor followed by a stronger dose when the discomfort continued.

"I always felt something was inside as I felt sudden pains - as if I was being stabbed by a sharp point," Kevin said.

The bite developed into a crater-like spot until the source of the problem popped out during the night.

Tropical disease expert Dr Matthew Dryden, based at Winchester's Royal Hampshire County Hospital, believes the creature was most likely a South African botfly.

He said: "From the description it would be most likely the botfly. The lava is deposited on a mosquito and very cleverly detaches when it feels warm skin. The lava then burrows into the skin and stays there for about eight to ten weeks.

"This one does seem to have been in the skin a long time but I have seen plenty of cases like it because it is common to be bitten in tropical destinations."

Kevin is recovering from the ordeal at home but refuses to be put off travelling. He and Christine have already booked a trip to Cuba at Christmas. He has not yet decided what to do with the botfly.