About Riaan & Marelize
Riaan
Riaan is a qualified fitter and turner and spent about 20 years working in the paper machine industry, namely for SAPPI, KIMBERLY CLARK, NAMPAK and PMT to name a few. He was one of the few people that could fix anything on these machines and was sent all over the world to repair them.
Today he can fix and build just about anything and is the main reason we have never needed to use contractors for anything. He fixes all our machinery, vehicles, buildings, pumps, etc on the farm and built all 3 our farms from the ground up doing the building, roofing, ceilings, tiles, plumbing, electric and so much more.
He has his own specialized paint business trading as Die Appelboom in Stilbay but also does building work. He recently built our house in Stilbay and a family member's too. As soon as our plans are finalized, he will start building our dream farm house.
Marelize
Marelize studied as a herbalist and has her own successful herbal medicine company, Pure Herbal Remedies. She is also a lifecoach and loves teaching people to grow within themselves.
Through the years of having farms and running several businesses, she learned how to do most things a farm involves as well as the things a business involves. She does all the marketing, bookkeeping, admin, etc for the businesses while also being hands on, on the farm and the businesses.
Our farms
In 2011 Riaan and Marelize met through off road motor biking and decided to buy a farm in Magaliesburg to start an offroad venue. They soon learned that the 34 hectar farm was a bit small for what they wanted to do so built it into a small resort with 10 campsites and 2 chalets. 4 years later they sold it at a nice profit and upgraded to the next farm.
They then bought a 200 hectar game farm near Rustenburg with an old delapidated school camp venue on it. Over a period of 5 years, they turned it into a roaring success with 2 school camp venues, chalets and campsites, doing over 100 camps a year. Feel free to look at the website www.kareekrans.co.za or just Google Karee Krans. The new owners are still running it as we did.
In 2020 the farm was put on the market due to the decline in the quality of the area and Riaan and Marelize decided to move to Stilbay to start a new, more peaceful life where a future was still possible and their daughter could start highschool in a safe place where teenagers still had some freedom. During the 3 years it was on the market, they travelled extensively spending mostly a week on the farm, followed by a week in Stilbay. They realized that there was no use further investing in that farm as the price of property in the area was declining drastically and the price of the farm was already reduced several times. It was priced out of most people's reach and the banks were not giving loans for farms so it had to be a cash sale. The farm finally sold in June 2023 and the new farm, now called Wildegees was bought.