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WHO WE ARE
Graeme and Karen Addison are the owners of
Otters' Haunt, a delightul and secluded
Guest House and Bush Camp on the Vaal River near Parys. The
property lies in the
 Vredefort
Dome, and it was this feature that first attracted the
couple to the area when they bought the derelict riverside
known as "The Deer Ranch" in 2000. With its
Renaissance-style architecture - apparently designed as a
riverside holiday home by an Italian family - the place had
real potential but was badly run down and had been flooded
several times. Graeme and Karen changed the name to
 Otters'
Haunt to mark the rare but wonderful sightings of two
species of otters (Cape Clawless and Spotted Necked). The
main house and outbuildings were renovated and by 2002 were
back to what once had been in the 1970s and 80s -
accommodation for visitors. Graeme acquired the adjoining
iLekwe farm property in 2003 and together the couple built
the A-frame Bush cabins on a kopje of granite overlooking
the Vaal River. You can see pictures of the Otters' Den
Guest House, Guinea Fowl chalet, and Full Moon Bush Camp on
the
website here.
GRAEME
Talks and Trails are led by popular writer Graeme Addison who has published
 numerous
articles on the Vredefort Structure and is currently writing
a popular illustrated
 book about the Dome from A to Z - that
is, from the birth of our planet to the emergency of human
life, with the big meteorite strike in the middle of it all. Graeme is the author of
seven books including White Water:
The World's Wildest Rivers (Struik, 2000) and The
Edge series of books on South African innovations in
science and technology (SAVI,
2000, 2005). He started
 as a journalist on the Cape Times. After flirting with the stage (he acted in several plays at
Rhodes University) he settled down to teaching journalism.
Graeme is former Professor of Communication at the
University of North West, and was a lecturer in journalism
at both Rhodes University and Technikon Natal. When he left
Rhodes in 1980 he decided to become a riverman and set
about pioneering all the major rafting routes on SA rivers
in the 1970s and 1980s. Throughout that time he worked in
marketing communications and taught journalism part-time at
Wits University. In due course he mutated to become a
science writer. Graeme's passion has always been for
scientific topics and he is a keen "backyard astronomer" as well
as rock-collector and reader of everything new on planetary
science.
KAREN
 Otters'
Haunt is managed and run by Karen whose real vocation in
life is being an explorer. She knows the Dome intimately,
having worked alongside Graeme to research the geology,
history and ecology of the area, and in preparing maps and
write-ups. Trained as a teacher of
the deaf, she teamed up with Graeme in the mid-eighties to
help run the country's first rafting company, Rivermen. They
went on to develop mountainbiking
trails and, as joint owners of
Traiblazers, led hiking trails as far north as Malawi. When
Graeme returned to academic life Karen went back to teaching
but soon
 the
appeal of the outdoors drew her. Currently, she paddles,
runs mountain extreme marathons, and manages Otters' Haunt - all taken in her stride.
If Karen is your Talks 'n Trails leader on a Dome excursion
you are sure to hear fascinating information about the
people, background history and landscape of the area, from
her research and personal experience.
The couple have one (adopted) son, Damian, who turned 21 in
2008. Graeme has three sons from a previous marriage, one of
whom, Corran, is a world-class paddler who represented SA at
the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. |
I'm
a writer of popular science and technology books and
articles, a former Professor of Communication whose
hobby is now "backyard astronomy" with history thrown
in! I'm a keen mountain-biker and kayaker, so the
Dome and Vaal River are my playground.
I'm
a former teacher who has worked with Graeme on many
aspects of science & local history research, and I have
got to know the Dome by preparing the maps and data used
in our various presentations. My passions are mountain
running and education. I manage Otters' Haunt.